Parts Answering Parts
by Jedi Amoira
Summary: A random assortment of scenes and snippets relating to ME 1, 2 and 3. Not chronological. Various POV, largely FemShep and Garrus. Both Kaidan and Garrus romances possible. Spoilers probable. Rating may increase later. Check here for updates 1st.
1. Enter Garrus

Chapter 1: Enter Garrus

**Disclaimer**—The Mass Effect Universe and everything in it belongs to BioWare. Only my words and my interpretation are my own. I derive no profit but pleasure from these works of homage.

**Notes: **This fic title will actually be a random assortment of all sorts of scenes, dialogues and snippets relating to ME—both 1 and 2. These chapters will not be in chronological order and will vary as to point of view. My (very vague) intention is to eventually assemble these bits and pieces into a more traditional narrative fic tentatively to be titled Two of a Kind, but I imagine it will be a long time before that takes shape (if it ever does), and I didn't want to wait that long to begin posting my little bits of plot bunny fluff.

**Fic Title Inspiration: **Whole \Whole\, n. 1. The entire thing; the entire assemblage of parts; totality; all of a thing, without defect or exception; a thing complete in itself. [1913 Webster];

Parts answering parts shall slide into a whole. -Pope. [1913 Webster]

**Almost-random Aside: **Some of you may wonder why I've decided to group bits together for NWN2 and ME, but have been posting composite chunks for DAO. This is largely due to length. The DAO stuff tends to be monster, even when incomplete. NWN2 and ME seem to be more cooperatively concise. My incomplete Ginny Weasley is/was being posted as a chronological narrative.

_**While I may not post on some of these fics for long periods of time, I have not abandoned any of them.**_

**Chapter-Specific Note:** This chapter takes place early in ME1. Very slight edit done 8-5-10.

* * *

Garrus Vakarian was aware three humans had entered the Tower and stopped to stare at him with interest undisguised, blatantly eavesdropping on his argument with Executor Pallin, but he didn't particularly care.

Oh, he knew he was sure to hear about it later—from the Executor, from his father, and from everyone in between, all scandalized he hadn't simply accepted his superior's support of his superior, like a good little turian, because that was the way it was done, all absolutely outraged he'd dared to call that into question in front of a human—any human—let alone three of them.

He still didn't care.

Saren ranked above him, ranked above Executor Pallin, ranked above his father even. Garrus didn't dispute that Saren was above the rules; Garrus could respect that. In fact, he flat out envied it.

If he'd been above the rules or, rather, empowered to make rules when they were needed and to make those rules work...

But he wasn't. And he never would be. That chance had long since passed. And, because he knew and valued what he had lost, he recognized that Saren had it, and he realized that Saren didn't appreciate what he had.

Power was a privilege. One that had to be earned and earned again every time it was used. Used because it had to be...and never, ever, abused.

Saren abused it. With impunity. Garrus knew he did. He couldn't prove it, but he didn't have to; he could feel it in his bones. The knowledge insulted him, goaded him, left him impotent and outraged.

Knowing something did no good. Doing something was what counted. And—not for the first time—there was nothing he could do.

Nothing his superiors would let him do.

As much as he longed to see Saren confronted with the slightest suggestion his behavior was out of line, Garrus knew there was no reason to bother sticking around. No matter how persuasive these humans—and it did offer a certain satisfaction, the idea of Saren being forced to answer to humans—no matter how compelling their argument, nothing awaited but more disappointment.

The humans flickered in the corner of his eye as he stormed past; a vague jumble of black and white and a single, stark flash of red.

As it turned out, it was just as well his frustration had goaded him back to the office, because an anxious message from one of his contacts awaited him. Garrus kind of doubted her misgivings heralded anything serious, but stepping down to the Wards to reassure her would be—at worst—a distraction, and—at best—it might just provide him with a welcome—and much-needed—chance to shoot something.

As it was, his contact barely had time to hustle him into a shadowy alcove with a more-or-less incomprehensibly babbled explanation before the thugs arrived on the scene.

The first grabbed the contact by the upper arms, making her flinch. Garrus slid his sniper rifle from its slot in his armor and slowly, carefully, extended the barrel from the stock in painstaking silence and only by touch, never taking his eyes off the contact and the thugs. He eased the rifle up into position.

The contact jostled frustratingly into and out of his rifle sight. If he pulled the trigger in time with one of those maddening asynchronous shifts, the results could be disastrous. But...if he didn't pull it at all, it was only a matter of time before the thugs injured the witness themselves...or before she cracked and screamed for Garrus, in which case things would really go to hell fast—

Something, some hint of movement, some faint click or hiss on a register audible to him, but apparently indistinguishable to humans—at least over the sound of their own raised voices—told Garrus the door to the clinic had opened a split second before the squad burst into the room. For a single, tense breath, he thought the thugs had back-up, but recognition formed as shapes as colors slid across his scope. Black armor and a flash—a stark pulse—of red.

And—of all things—a rather bored-looking krogan. Garrus was sure there was a story behind that, and he was pretty sure he'd be seeing enough of this group to hear it.

Even as the thought crossed his mind in a mixture of amusement and amazement, he saw the image still in his scope; saw that one split second of perfect opportunity and instinctively pulled his fingers toward his palm as if to seize the chance before him...He pulled the trigger. The thug dropped like a sack of meat.

Garrus stepped from under cover...

Rather to his surprise, the least apparently intimidating member of the squad—a human female whose head barely cleared his shoulder—was already looking at him. She didn't glance at the body on the floor, or even in the direction of the still-shaking doctor. She looked Garrus in the eye and said, directly-almost analytically-without the faintest hint of disbelief or jealousy, merely stating fact, "Good shot."

It was hard to tell—he'd never heard such a tone from a human—but the words were almost too dry, a little too firm, as if pointing out that flawless execution didn't quite justify the questionable necessity of endangering the contact...and, yet, Garrus could also have sworn a corner of the human's mouth had quirked upward...an expression he might have interpreted as amused—or even admiring. He'd thought he'd begun to read humans rather well...but this one made him wonder...

This time he looked at her, really looked, sizing her up. She waited, lounging back on the balls of her feet, totally at ease and not at all at rest, ready to spring into action at a second's notice. She studied him as he assessed her and made no secret of it any more than he did. Garrus felt his mandibles flair into a faint smirk. She grinned back at him in that odd, flat, broad human fashion. Somehow, as alien as she seemed, Garrus had the odd, unshakeable impression the two of them already understood each other very, very well.


	2. Half spoken Words

**Chapter Title Inspiration:** "She tries to speak and stops with half-spoken words." Vergil, Aeneid.

Apparently the titling function on doesn't like hyphens. My apologies to those of you (like me) the discrepancy bothers.

**Chapter Note:** This scene takes place soon after Horizon, probably later the same day/night, and probably preceeding chapter 3 of Parts Answering Parts, the chronological ordering of this chapter and the next being largely an accident of luck. Slight Edit 8-5-10

* * *

Shepard grinned at him, the expression raw, pained but honest. "Thanks for telling Kaidan he was being an ass."

Garrus grinned back. "Hey, you know I call 'em like I see 'em...even when I should keep my mouth shut...probably."

"The galaxy would be a hell of a lot better place if everyone called problems—called 'em and took their shots," Shepard said simply. "But damned if even the good ones—the best—will so much as step out of the sights. It's enough to make my blood boil—or give me a pounding headache."

"Alenko always did give nearly as many migranes as he got," Garrus couldn't help saying.

"Did he?" Under other circumstances, her intrigued expression would have made him laugh. "How did you manage to avoid going stark raving mad?"

"It wasn't easy..." Garrus said with a half-shake of his head, his own rueful chuckle.

Shepard shook her head in sympathetic response, light flickering across that odd, limp down humans had in place of fringe. Strange stuff, really—even after years of observing it a countless plethora of variations, Garrus still hadn't been able to divine what—if any—discernible purpose it could possibly serve.

And yet humans—and not just women; he'd caught Alenko adjusting his according to his reflection in some shiny hullplate or machinery-face more than once—seemed strangely obsessed with the stuff. Shepard perhaps less than some—Williams, for example, had apparently been stockpiling it.

"It's never easy, is it, Garrus? And yet, we keep on doing it."

"Being the good guys, you mean?" Garrus responded, surprised. "I suppose we do, at that. You'd think we'd learn."

"Nah. The likes of us are too damn pig-headed for that—actually," Shepard said, suddenly pensive, "I suppose that's how we ended up here—alone. Everyone else in the galaxy—everyone else—"

Garrus knew her voice had gone hard and bitter because of Alenko, but the tone matched his own feelings in the days and weeks after she'd died, his rage, his disappointment, his disbelief, his disgust, his sense of abandonment as he'd realized no one wanted the truth...

No one appreciated her help, no one respected what she'd accomplished, no one was willing to honor her sacrifice by continuing to fight...and even her memory was lost...

"—accepts injustice...they accept uncertainty...they accept insecurity...they accept ignorance and embrace powerlessness like terms of surrender for battles they've already lost...But we're too...what...brave?.. stupid?..to go down without a fight. Everyone looks at us as though we've failed—failed ourselves, failed them—and, maybe in the end they'll be right...but, hell, at least we've tried—and, ultimately, they're the ones who failed us. I mean—" Shepard trailed off, blood rushing to her cheeks, staining them an even deeper shade of red than usual.

It took Garrus several heartbeats to recognize her unfamiliar expression—Shepard was embarrassed.

He watched her, surprised by the urge to reach out and touch her in some way, as she'd touched him with her voice, with her words. He wanted to touch her, but he was uncertain, unsure.

Her eyes reflected that, too. "I...uh," she mumbled awkwardly. "I didn't mean to put words in your mouth."

"I suppose you did," Garrus said, surprised he hadn't noticed.

Shepard's flush deepened again at the words. Garrus felt an immediate twinge of guilt he couldn't quite explain. After all, he'd only been confirming something she'd pointed out, something he often did. "But they were _my_ words, Shepard. We've always spoken the same the language."


	3. The Continuous Thread

**Chapter Title Inspiration: **The events in our lives happen in a sequence in time, but in their significance to ourselves they find their own order: the continuous thread of revelation. —Eudora Welty

**Chapter Notes: **This takes place soon after the confrontation on Horizon, probably late that same night, or early the day after the Horizon encounter. Largely due to an accident of luck, it takes place almost immediately following the previous chapter of _Parts Answering Parts_. Slight Edit 8-5-10

The line "No body, no crime," is borrowed from an episode of _Psych_.

* * *

At some point in that long, awful night, she realized Kaidan hadn't been able to see past the Cerberus logo to the woman beneath because he'd never bothered—had he even ever tried?—to look beyond the stripe on her shoulder, or the Alliance N7 she'd always worn.

Well...the stripe was still there, but that clearly wasn't enough.

The realization didn't rush over her with a surge of shock, either.

It emerged slowly, drifting slowly to the center of her awareness, a submerged corpse bobbing to the surface. She'd seen the signs. Some part of her had even recognized them for what they were...ripples in the seemingly smooth surface of their attraction.

But she'd wanted to be wrong so badly...

She'd weighted the truth down and let it sink to the bottom of her mind, the pit of her stomach, and wedge there, hoping it might dissolve with time. _No body, no crime._

It might even have worked...if things had been different. If she and Kaidan had ever gotten enough spare time away from the ship...away from their duties and responsibilities, away from the Alliance...he might actually have learned something about her, about Jane Shepard, as a woman. He might even have liked it.

But possible didn't mean probable.

It was far more likely Kaidan would have ignored anything that could taint, tarnish, crack, or even color the plaster saint in his head—in his heart. Probably to the extent he'd never have noticed there was even anything to avoid.

Whatever their differences were alike in that. And that, she thought wryly, was something—maybe the only thing—they had ever really shared.

The admission was bitter.

But...oddly enough...it was also almost...sweet...because Garrus was there, holding her hand.

They had always looked directly at one another...

Recognizing—acknowledging—the simple fact of something she had always taken for granted without regarding its rarity, without appreciating its implications...made her stop and notice how much of herself she'd unwittingly exposed...made her see—made her feel—herself to be vulnerable in his sights.

That was immensely comforting...

and insanely terrifying.

She suddenly felt a new appreciation, a new curiosity, a new guilt for the path the last two years had carved through the center of his life. If things had been reversed...

the thought alone made it difficult to breathe. But...if they had been...

she wondered if she could have broken even with him. It wouldn't—as he had said...and, oh, the tenor of his voice as he'd said it!—have been easy. No, not easy at all. Never easy.

And if she had managed some solace, some way to remember and to honor, some semblance of normalcy, some way to solider on...if her ship and her squad had provided her with that...Wrex or Liara or Kaidan or Tali—and how telling it was she would think of Wrex or Liara before Kaidan when it came to companionship, when it came to solace...

and Garrus, of course, Garrus before them all...

How could she have been so blind? Why hadn't she seen it before...before Ilos?

She knew why.

She'd been complicit.

But that wasn't the point.

The point was that if she had found some measure of peace in her friends, and if they too had died...if she felt she'd failed them...even if one of them hadn't betrayed her, betrayed the others...well...she would never have been the same.

Hell, come to think of it, that hadn't happened, and she already wasn't the same.

But, when all was said and done, she was beginning to think she might yet live to be damned grateful for that.


	4. A Way

**Chapter Title:** No specific quotations, but a nod to several ideas contained within the text. Most obviously (but not only) the final line.

**Chapter Notes:** It's probably obvious, but this scene takes place not long after the battle of the Citadel.

The idea of Shepard's First Rule is (very) vaguely inspired by Terry Goodkind's novel _Wizard's First Rule_-I'm not a die-hard fan of the entire series, but the first book is a must read!

There will be another brief statement of the even-more obvious at the end of this chapter...so as not to give away the punchline before you've read it.

* * *

"So...about this Spectre training of yours..."

"Shepard..." Garrus tensed, his gizzard lurching. "Are you trying to tell me this is a bad idea?"

Shepard shook her head violently, making her shaggy auburn hair sway and brush across her hardsuit collar. "No! Absolutely not. I think it's brilliant, actually. You'll make a damn fine Spectre—one of the best—and I _will_ tell the Council as much—whether you like it or not."

Garrus chuckled, mostly nervous, but partly amused. "You can't seriously think I'd object to anything you said? I never fail to enjoy the things you can do with your mouth—Wait. I don't think that came out quite right. "

"It's just...I thought...I mean...I guess I mean...I hoped..." she sputtered the words, more agitated and uncomfortable than he had ever seen her, but, somehow, smiling. "Oh, damn it all to hell! Do you really want to leave the Normandy?"

"What? Of course not! Why would you even think—oh! Shit. Shit!" Garrus shifted on his feet, "I didn't realize..."

There was a long pause.

"I...uh...if that's what it takes, then...well..." He raised his head, unconsciously mimicking a gesture he'd seen her make time and time again.

_Whatever it takes, no matter the cost, no matter the consequence. _Their eyes met, the unspoken words hanging between them. They'd always understood one another. They were two of kind. Spectres.

Another, longer pause.

Shepard stopped, sighed, took a deep breath. Raised her chin and squared her shoulders as if preparing to make an important presentation to the Council. One she didn't expect to go particularly well...but maybe that went without saying, knowing the Council.

"Garrus, you didn't sign on to go chasing geth into all corners of the galaxy on the off-chance they might slip up and lead us to the Reaper Hive. You signed on to stop Saren—and you did. We did. That was enough—more than enough. I can't ask you to do it twice."

Garrus smirked. "Oh, really? Then why are we having this conversation, exactly?"

"Look, the thing is..." Shepardrubbed the back of her neck. "Spectres are known for working alone...but—you might have noticed—I prefer to be be part of a team..."

Their eyes met again, the look strong and solid. Unshakeable.

"If I could pick anyone in the galaxy to fly into the face of death on my wing it would be you, Garrus."

"Is that so, Commander? I thought you and Alenko..."

She blushed darkly. "Thought, my ass, Vakarian. You knew. We did—we are. Kaidan's...special. But I said anyone, and I meant anyone."

"Shepard...I'm...honored. Are you asking me to rejoin you after I'm instated? I hadn't realized that was an option."

"More than an option. A petition," she said without hesitation.

"Then just try and stop me," Garrus said with immediate, equal conviction.

"Garrus," she said earnestly, laying her gloved hand on his armored forearm, "if you want to go to training, don't let me stop you. Hell, I'll help you pack, but...if it wasn't necessary—training, I mean—would you..."

"Shepard..." He only realized what a large part of him had been tense—ever since Shepard had asked him what he saw himself doing after Saren was brought to justice—when it unwound, making his gizzard twitch and his heart do flips. "...are you saying..."

Garrus had assumed the question had implied a change Shepard thought inevitable, maybe even necessary...and he'd been willing to accept that, even if it was a change he didn't particularly want. But, if he'd known...if he'd realized... "...are you asking me to stay?"

She dropped her hand and stepped back as if reminding herself to keep her distance. Her cool voice cutting his agitation short, quick and clean. "Not if it means forfeiting your chance at being a Spectre." Again.

"I think that's really my call to make, isn't it, Commander?" He tilted his head back and to the side.

"Maybe" Shepard shrugged. "But I wouldn't be able to live with the guilt...and sooner or later, you might start to resent me. I really couldn't live with that." Her voice was sober, as serious as he'd ever it heard it, and she wasn't serious often. She'd made her decision, and it wasn't up for discussion.

Garrus felt a sudden, hot surge of frustration. Normally, he'd have been delighted by the compliment, but now all he could hear was her refusal to let him assess the situation and decide his own course of action. Her rejection.

"Then why question my departure—why make me question it?" he snapped. "I know you're the brilliant tactician who defeated Saren—and the geth, no less-but...you're not really making a whole lot of sense here."

She grinned wryly. "Shepard's First Rule: There's almost always more than one way to accomplish an objective. The trick is to pick the right approach. Remember how we met?"

Garrus bit down on the urge to ask her what objective she could possibly accomplish by tying his gizzard into knots and nodded.

"Why did I go to Dr. Michel's clinic? Why did you?" Shepard prompted, eyeing him like a teacher hoping her student is about to make a brilliant break-through.

Garrus hated to disappoint, but the answer to that question was far too limited to leave room for discovery. Garrus snorted. "Searching for dirt on Saren."

"Why?"

"He'd gone rogue and killed another Spectre...during what was supposed to be the Normandy's shakedown cruise on Eden Prime." Garrus had always prided himself on remembering the little details. They were so often of use, even if you couldn't predict exactly how or when that might be.

"And why was Nihlus—the other Spectre—on our shakedown cruise?"

"Because the mission was supposed to be one of several," Garrus' eyes widened, the plates on his forehead flaring slightly. "Assessing your suitability to become a Spectre."

Shepard grinned and clapped her hands together in satisfaction. "Remember what Anderson told us about his history with Saren?"

Garrus still didn't see exactly where this was going, but she'd never given him any reason to regret following her lead, and answering a few questions was quite a bit easier than most of things he ended up doing in her service. "His mission with Saren was supposed to—" assess his suitability to become a Spectre. The realization quaked through him like the tread of an approaching Colussus.

Shepard nodded vigorously. "Exactly."

"Well, I'll be damned." Garrus folded his arms across his chest, leaning back on his heels to regard her in bemused approbation. "Do you think the Council will agree?"

"If Saren, the geth, and Sovereign couldn't stand in our way, I doubt the Council could...not that I think they'd try. Right now, I imagine they'll agree to pretty much anything that might convince me and my big, inconvenient story to get our dirty hands off their false sense of security and disappear back into the Terminus systems like good little drones."

The corners of her mouth quirked, her semi-habitual wry grin struggling to reappear. "Plus, you know, I have a way with words..."

* * *

Aforementioned Statement: It's probably (also) obvious, but not mentioned outright, that Shepardand Garrus have just agreed to "ask" the Council to allow Garrus to train as a Spectre by accompanying Shepardon missions rather than through the more formal turian training program he had been planning to attend.

Sincere Request: Reviews and feedback are greatly appreciated!


	5. Light

**Chapter Title: **A sensible man will remember that the eyes may be confused in two ways - by a change from light to darkness or from darkness to light; and he will recognize that the same thing happens to the soul. ~Plato

Light can be gentle, dangerous, dreamlike, bare, living, dead, misty, clear, hot, dark, violet, springlike, falling, straight, sensual, limited, poisonous, calm and soft. ~Sven Nykvist

Slight Edit 8-5-10

* * *

Light.

Bright white.

Searing.

Lancing through her closed eyes and into her skull.

She would have groaned, but...somehow...her body couldn't quite produce the sound. She felt...submerged. Or maybe encased. In ice.

Or adrift.

In space.

She remembered...

space.

Space was dark...you were supposed to go toward the light when you died...but...

someone...an asari...in dark clothing...sprawled across the floor at her feet...said there was no light...someone was crying...Liara? Liara was crying...her mother was dead...Shepard remembered...

she was dying.

She opened her eyes.

Light burned through her like a star going nova. Or like a ship...her ship...exploding.

And slowly began to resolve itself into the image of something mundane...like a lamp. She frowned. That seemed...wrong...

She reached up...to embrace eternity or to move the damn lamp out of her face, she wasn't quite sure which...Once she figured that out, she imagined things might begin to make more sense.

A hand grabbed hers, pushed it back against something hard, cool and smooth. The hand seemed alien, unfamiliar. Not one of her squad. Not one of her crew. What did that mean-was it good or bad they weren't here?

Words. More words. Names...something about waking...something about sedatives...

Slate blue eyes staring into hers with something like possession...something like concern...

She felt a flicker of confusion, a flicker of annoyance bordering on fear.

Darkness flowed over her...

There was no light.

There was nothing...and she gave into it with something like relief.

Sound.

A voice.

A name.

_Shepard._

A familiar name.

Her name.

The voice wanted her to do something...

_You have to get up._

She was lying on a cold, hard, slab. The stiffness in her neck, the knots in her shoulders, the ache in her back flared to life. She must have been lying there a very long time. She reached up and almost-absent-mindedly wrenched her jaw into place. Her skin felt rough and foreign beneath her fingers. She hauled herself upright, wincing at the lingering tenderness in her ribs.

Death certainly was uncomfortable.

And weirdly familiar.

Suiting up in armor, just as she had done every day of her life since she turned eighteen was almost unsettling, it was so surreal. A feeling only intensified by the realization that the armor was almost her armor.

Almost, but not quite.

It was black and grey with the bold red stripe on the shoulder...but...the plates were different, lighter. The material was different, too. And the N7 was missing from the collar. There was another insignia there in its place...one that she couldn't quite place...but that made her stomach lurch with unpleasant recognition on sight...as if she ought to remember...

The weapon was different, too. But its weight felt natural in her hand. Comfortable. Comforting.

The first sound of a mechanical voice gave her a jolt similar to the sight of the insignia on her armor. It was so...ordinary...expected...almost routine...and, yet, it was...different. These weren't geth, they were mechs.

It was a sad commentary on her life that geth would have been less confusing.

Still, mechs were as easy-if not easier-to destroy than geth.

Their absence made the space around her seem huge, echoing and empty.

Like space.

It was probably best not to think of that.

Still, she felt very, very alone...

and very, very exposed without Kaidan and Garrus on her three and nine.

Kaidan's face, a mask, frozen, staring, stricken.

The pods.

Joker.

Garrus.

Tali.

Liara.

They'd made it free and clear.

She knew they had.

She had to believe that.

But if they'd survived...where were they?

Why weren't they here?

Wherever here was...


	6. Absence

**Note: **Thanks to all who have added this story to Favorites or Alerts. It's always nice to know readers are interested. Reviews are also welcome. Criticism, too, as long as it's constructive. Also, I doubt this has to be said, but while I don't own the universe or the characters, I do work hard on my little stories, and I love them, so please don't print or post them elsewhere without my knowledge. Thanks.

**Chapter Title: **Absence and death are the same-only that in death there is no suffering. - Theodore Roosevelt.

Absence weakens mediocre passions and increases great ones, as the wind blows out candles and kindles fires. -Francois de la Rouchefoucauld

**Chapter Note: **This is what I picture going through Shepard's head during a very sleepless night after the Freedom's Progress debrief. Slight Edit 8-5-10

* * *

Shepard had seen Tali and that was something, something comforting.

It was...frustrating...to know she was headed into danger...

Maybe that just couldn't be avoided. After all, she'd be in danger when she rejoined the squad, too. Shepard knew that. But...when all was said and done, Shepard preferred to have her friends in danger at a proximity that allowed her to minimize the threat and run interference.

Given the quarian reaction to the mention of Cerberus, Shepard had expected TIM to be less than enthusiastic about Tali, and it hadn't escaped her attention that he had spoken as though he had the right to grant-or deny-Tali's eventual inclusion in the squad, but-whether TIMmy-boy was ready to acknowledge it or not-Tali had said she was willing to help once her mission was complete, and that settled that.

Shepard had known about Wrex. Well...sort of. She'd seen him off to Tuchanka herself, a little more than a week after the Battle of the Citadel. She hoped the fact he hadn't left meant his efforts to instill a new set of priorities in the krogan were seeing some success. If so, at least he was one friend she could think of as both happy and safe.

She missed Kaidan.

That was part of it.

She wanted to talk to him, hear him say her name. She wanted to see the corners of his dark hazel eyes crinkle with joy, watch the ends of his mouth quirk in that smile that wasn't a smile, but the promise of smile that drove her to distraction...an anticipation only heightened by the frequent lack of fulfillment. From the moment she'd met him, before she'd even seen the suggestion, she'd been waiting for that smile. That smile that so rarely came.

She missed Kaidan...but...she wasn't surprised. She might have asked for him first, but she hadn't expected she'd be able to spend any extended amount of time with him...not yet.

If she'd been gone even a fraction of the time Cerberus claimed she had...and, unfortunately, Joker and Dr. Chakwas both made it sound as if Cerberus was completely on the up and up as far as that went...Kaidan would have been reassigned. Reassigned and on duty. Unable to drop everything and come running...however much she might wish he would.

However much he might like to...and there was a chance he might not. Not anymore.

Even if it had been less than two years, even if he hadn't forgotten whatever might once have been between them...duty had always come first with him. And it always would. Kaidan was a career man. The Alliance Navy was part and parcel of who he was...she couldn't ask him to compromise that.

Sometimes...she wished he would focus a little more on demonstrating his feelings for her and on maintaining the status quo a little less. After all, she sincerely doubted the Alliance wanted to give itself a black eye by criticizing humanity's first and only Spectre for breaking regs. Even if she was still technically Alliance...and they couldn't punish him for fraternization without dragging her into it.

But she didn't want to ask.

Still, she wanted-she needed-to talk to him, at least.

Hell...she still could...TIM couldn't-or, she suspected, _wouldn't_-help, but all she had to do was try Kaidan's old Alliance contact info. And Anderson's. And Hackett's. One of them had to hit. No need to panic.

Liara working for the Shadow Broker was more of a shock...if it was true. But, honestly, Liara had spent most of the chase after Saren shipside, digging through her own research and the Prothean data discs periodically recovered by the squad. If the search for the Reapers was now about the Collectors and not about the Protheans, the asari would probably be neither particularly interested nor particularly useful.

They were friends, and Shepard would love to see her again and catch up on old times...when the immediate threat was neutralized.

At least TIM had been able to tell her where to begin looking when she had time.

And that was what was bothering her...or who, really.

Garrus.

She'd asked about him right after Kaidan. Barely waited for an answer, in fact, because, she'd already expected Kaidan to be out of reach, but Garrus...Garrus would always be ready and willing to throw caution to the wind and lend her a hand when she needed it.

He was her friend. Her partner in non-regulation law enforcement, if not crime.

At least, she'd begun to think of him that way...and she'd thought...maybe...he had, too.

It bothered her...very much, actually, that even TIM couldn't tell her where he was. Not even as vaguely as he'd placed Liara or Kaidan.

She almost hoped he could and simply wouldn't...because Cerberus didn't like or trust aliens...or even because he was trying to control her by keeping her isolated from her friends...which seemed a bit less likely given the presence of Joker and Doctor Chakwas on the ship...but...

Even if that was part of it, a man who claimed information was his business was unlikely to cultivate the appearance of ignorance where it could be avoided. She tended to believe TIM would have placed Garrus...if he could.

If he couldn't...well, with luck, that was merely because Garrus was out and about on Spectre business, and keeping a low profile...though given her own experiences while they were chasing Saren, he'd have to be a miracle worker to manage it.

As a member of the Council, Anderson ought to have some idea how a Spectre could be contacted.

She wanted it to be that easy. But she had a nagging suspiscion in the pit of her stomach that Garrus was far more...missing...than that.

She hoped he was okay and feared he wasn't.

If the fate of humanity-and possibly all of galatic civilization-wasn't at stake again-or was it still?-she would have begun looking for him immediately. As it was...well...she was still tempted.

She might have done it. If she had known where to begin.

Aside from contacting Anderson. Which she would do.

She didn't believe it would do any good.

Still, Garrus couldn't have vanished. Not really. Not completely.

She'd just have to start looking for some way to find him. Maybe she could delegate. It would be something to distract her new yeoman from trying to discuss how she was "adjusting" to her "new situation" every few minutes.

Shepard smiled wryly, feeling a sudden spark of faint-but-definite satisfaction.


	7. The Right Regrets

Notes: Huge thanks to everyone who added this story (or me) to their favorites and/or alerts! I appreciate your interest and support! I have lots of ideas percolating, even if they're taking their own sweet time to brew! I hope most chapters will be longer this, but...unfortunately, no promises...for now.

Chapter Title Reference: Maybe all one can do is hope to end up with the right regrets. ~Arthur Miller

* * *

Kaidan,

Not even death itself could make me forget the night before Ilos, trust me.

But maybe you were right. Among all the infinite wonders of the universe, the beauty of that night-of us-was that it was fleeting. It was never meant to last, never meant to come again.

You said I reminded you of what it felt like to be human. If you remember anything, I hope you remember that. Take time to enjoy it while you can-it's no joke that life is short.

Be happy, Kaidan. As long as you are, that's enough for me. My only regrets are the right ones.

Shep


	8. Two Pains

**Note: **Thanks again to all the people who've taken time to encourage me by adding me or my story to favorites. Also, a huge thank you to Ryoko Metallium for this story's first review; I hold that entirely responsible for how quickly this chapter was written. So, as always, any and all constructive feedback is appreciated. ;-)

**Chapter Specific Note: **Takes place shortly following Garrus' recruitment mission and directly prior to Mordin's recruitment mission.

**Chapter Title: **"We must all suffer from one of two pains: the pain of discipline or the pain of regret. The difference is discipline weighs ounces while regret weighs tons." -Jim Rohn

* * *

"It's up to you, Commander," Garrus said, but he knew what he wanted and he figured she did, too. Shepard always took the opinions of her crew into account when she made her decisions. "If you need me, I'm not going to let a cough keep me back," he said anyway, just to make it clear. He had little doubt of what would happen, because it was what had always happened. What _would_ always happen. _Just like old times._

Shepard's eyes met his for moment, steady and assessing. She tilted her chin slightly, almost imperceptibly, a gesture he'd long since come to recognize as a sort of affirmation. A sign of agreement. But when she moved, she stepped forward, brushing past him as she stepped away from the quarantine zone and back toward the dock.

Garrus stared after her, unmoving, confused. Something was wrong somewhere. This wasn't right. She'd never left him behind before. A small, traitorous part of his mind whispered that she'd never walked into a situation in which he might be in more danger than any other member of her crew before, either, but he scarcely noticed behind the roaring surge of his own breath. _Never._ Except...he turned away from that current before thought could take wing.

The human in the Cerberus uniform-Jacob?- cast Garrus a glance that might have been sympathetic, or maybe just bemused, and strode after Shepard.

They were nearly around the corner when Garrus realized Shepard either hadn't noticed his hesitation or was just ignoring it. The latter, if he knew her as well as he thought he did. She wasn't going to stop, wasn't going to turn back. Well, that was like her, even if her sudden about-face was completely alien.

Grudging, he moved, his long legs closing the distance easily. "Shepard-"

"EDI," Shepard said as if she hadn't heard him, though he knew full well she might be speaking to the ship, but she was responding to him, "inform Operative Lawson of the situation, and ask her to be ready and waiting when we arrive. Officer Vakarian will serve as acting XO in her absence."

Garrus huffed in exasperation. Shepard ignored him. Studiously. He felt a surge of something very much akin to rage. He was vaguely aware of Jacob eyeing him warily, the muscles in his arm tensing slightly, preparing to pull his shotgun in less than a heartbeat, if necessary.

Any other time, Garrus would have been approving, if mildly amused. Now he was simply annoyed. He would never hurt Shepard; he damn well wanted to protect her, that was the problem.

As if catching wind of his thought, Shepard turned her head toward him and smiled, just a fraction. It was a sad smile, but there was something else behind the sadness, something Garrus didn't quite recognize. "Chin up, Vakarian, you won't be missing much. Just the Blue Suns and some vorcha-nothing you haven't seen before."

The tall, graceful woman in white was walking toward them, her heels clicking on the plated floor of the dock. Coming to take his place.

Garrus bit down on his irritation, determined to keep his attention on the root of the problem. "Shepard. All the more reason-"

Shepard's grey eyes flashed like lightning across the heated summer sky on Palaven. "Dammit, Garrus," she said, forgetting to be the Commander, forgetting to be formal, "where I come from, no means _no_! I-we-can't afford to-" the words twisted and clogged in her throat, finally breaking off completely.

"Too close," she whispered, so faintly he wondered he doubted the Cerberus Operatives, both waiting at the end of the corridor, pretending not to stare as politely as they could manage, could hear. In fact, he wondered if she could. And if she couldn't...did she even know she what she was saying?

She cleared her throat and squared her shoulders. "-to be slowed down by some stupid disease," she continued more audibly, as if she'd never hesitated. Never interrupted her own sentence. "Especially one that can be easily avoided," she added pointedly. "We-I-need you. So get on the damned ship-and that's an order, Vakarian."

He was left without a weapon to bring to the fight. "Fine,"Garrus snarled and sprang toward the ship, "if that's the way you want it."

"Back before you know it," Shepard called after him, brightly, but a dark, lingering note of doubt touched the words like tarnish.


	9. The Problem of the Past

**Note: **Thanks again to all the people who've taken time to encourage me by adding me or my story to favorites. And, most especially, thanks to those few who've written reviews. Your interest and support is always appreciated, and often instrumental to maintaining the inspiration necessary to develop a story.

**Chapter Title: **"The past is a ghost, the future a dream, and all we ever have is now." -Bill Cosby

"The problem in defense is how far you can go without destroying from within what you are trying to defend from without." ~Dwight D. Eisenhower

**Chapter-Specific Notes: **This chapter takes place during the events of ME, following the mission UNC: Dead Scientists. I have vague plans of a future chapter to precede this as well as a future chapter to follow it.

* * *

Shepard had lost track of how long she'd been sitting on the rough, rocky ridge, staring into the skies of Ontarom. She longed to feel humbled by beauty, by power...by sheer open space. Staring into those fathomless blue depths surging and crackling with tempestuous amber sparks, she felt she ought to find her problems dwarfed and dazzled into insignificance. Just like the silvery exhaust trails of the Alliance pick-up shuttle she knew were there but couldn't see. But, if anything, her problems simply felt bigger, closer, more overwhelming than ever. Like an inexorable tide, pulling her back into the maelstrom of the past.

The soft, skittering sound of a pebble bouncing down the rock face brought her head whipping around, her hand automatically reaching for her pistol. Garrus froze in mid-step, talons extended slightly out and away from his body in a conciliatory gesture, and rolled his shoulders, looking sheepish. Shepard's motion stopped and faded away before it had even fully emerged into existence. She turned and looked back at the sky, allowing him to regain some measure of dignity as he stepped up beside her.

Garrus was eyeing her the way a gunnery sergeant eyed a raw recruit about to make a terrible mistake.

Shepard sighed and reached up to rub her temples, her fingers dipping down as if to confirm the thin, smooth line bisecting her eyebrow still remained.

"I get the distinct impression you have something you want to ask me."

"Well, uh, yeah..." Garrus paused, staring past her, possibly looking for the same marks of passage she'd tried and failed to detect. "That...uh...doctor...he's no better than Saleon, and you let me shoot _him_."

"That's not exactly a question," she observed wryly, feeling the corners of her mouth quirk. "But you're right. On both counts. He's not. And I did."

Garrus huffed softly, a sound of frustration or amusement. Probably both. They brought that out in each other.

"As personal as that situation felt, what Saleon did wasn't as personal as what that guy-" Garrus waved an expansive talon in the direction of the horizon, "did to...your...friend. To you."

She grunted vaguely. More or less in agreement, which Garrus seemed to catch, though he may or may not also have noticed her reluctance to think about the subject. Let alone discuss it.

Garrus folded himself stiffly down onto the rock beside her. "So why not let-"

"Toombs" she supplied absently. Helpfully, but absently.

"Toombs." Garrus repeated as if making a note of the name for future reference. The plates on his forehead flared slightly. "Huh. Tombs. Isn't that what you humans call those holes in the ground where you cache the spirits of your dead?"

"The spelling is different," she said, more to ward off the sudden chill ghosting along her skin than to educate her companion in the arcana of the human language. "But, yeah, that is kinda the meaning of a word that sounds exactly the same."_ And he is the repository of something-maybe everything-that's haunted me for years, if that's what you're asking._

"Uh," Garrus said eloquently. And shook himself. "Right. So...uh...why not let...this guy who sounds like the spirits of your dead...rid the galaxy of one more twisted criminal? That guy deserved punishment just as much as Saleon."

"Is _that_ what you think?" she asked, surprised. "Was that what taking Saleon out was about, Garrus? Punishment?"

"_Isn't _that what it was about, Commander? He committed a crime-_crimes_-and we made sure he _paid the price_."

"Well," she said, and stopped, at a loss. She shook her head and laughed just a bit, ruefully. "Yes."

"Well," Garrus repeated, sounding smug. But something more. He sounded relieved; she thought she understood. Punishment was simple, something concrete, something he had to question only when it was missing, undeserved, or incomplete. She understood all too well. "Then?"

"You-_we_-made sure Saleon paid for what he had done, because we _could_, Garrus. We-_you__-_knew what _he_ had done."

"That's my point!" Garrus said impatiently. "You-and this, this..._Toombs_-knew what that guy," he waved at the horizon again, more violently than before, "had done, too!"

Shepard laughed again. Shortly. The sound hurt her ears. It hurt her heart. "Toombs may have known what Dr. Wayne had done, Garrus, but he also knew he didn't do those things alone-"

"What difference does that make? He still did them!"

"And if he died, he couldn't do them anymore," she agreed wearily. _Oh, how I wish all wars were so easy to win. Or even most wars. I'd settle for most wars. I would. _She sighed. "But, Garrus, all those other people he was working with-they could." _And they would. And they most likely will._

"So...you're saying...you spared one criminal now...so you-well, someone...probably not you, actually-could stop other criminals later?"

Strange, how hearing that one hesitant question somehow left her feeling more awed and amazed than all the wonders of this world.

"Isn't that the point?" she asked softly. "Isn't that why Saleon haunted you? Not because of what he had done to all the victims you knew about, but because of what he could do to all those victims you would never know about? Isn't _that_ what killing him was about, Garrus?"

"Well," he said slowly, considering. Then, sounding surprised, "yes?"

"Well, then," she said, and smiled.

And Garrus smiled back.

For a few moments, they looked out at the sky together.


	10. How Much of Myself

**Note: **All standard disclaimers still apply. Thanks again to all the people who've taken time to encourage me by adding me or my story to favorites. And, most especially, thanks to those few who've written reviews. Your interest and support is always appreciated, and often instrumental to maintaining the inspiration necessary to develop a story.

**Chapter Title: **Directly from story text. But here are some related quotes."I have had to fight like hell and fighting like hell has made me what I am." ~John Arbuthnot Fisher

We are becoming the servants in thought, as in action, of the machine we have created to serve us. ~John Kenneth Galbraith

**Chapter-Specific Notes: **The current placement of this scene is after-perhaps very late the same night, perhaps one night later than _Parts Answering Parts: _Chapter 6: Absence. If you have an opinion on where this scene should be placed in a story arc, let me know. The phrase "cause and effect in a hell of a mess" is used by Archie Goodwin-gumshoe-in one of the many excellent Nero Wolfe novels by Rex Stout. The "tangled web" is an oblique reference to Sir Walter Scott's _Marmion_: "what a tangled web we weave/when first we practice to deceive!"

* * *

Her stomach hollowed with realization as she walked under the stars, time so slow it ceased to exist-or at least to matter, her own breath rasping in her ears.

The world-her world-had ended; she couldn't save it.

How could space be so quiet, so calm, so empty, so unscarred, so...so _unmoved_?

She looked into infinity and saw Kaidan's face. She didn't know if she was comforted or terrified by the sight.

She could feel Joker's arm, solid muscles sliding and bunching over something light and hollow, something fragile and precious...like life...within the unbridled violence of her grasp. She could hear him shouting, but the ground was suddenly shifting beneath her feet, the words didn't make any sense...

There was a blinding flare of white light, and she was spiralling into it...or through it...

Shepard woke with a stifled scream, her heart pounding in her ears as if desperate to escape.

The icy blue glow of the fish tank washed over her, eerily reminiscent of Alchera...

As if that weren't waking nightmare enough, the low blue light reminded her of the blue glow of Saren's biotics in that final battle on the Citadel, the glow of an undead, mechanical monster, the puppet of a Reaper.

_Bio-synthetic fusion. Cybernetics._ The words burrowed through her scalp and crawled along her spine. Every time she closed her eyes, she saw Saren burning blue against the lids. He'd used those words to describe himself..._a synthesis of organic and machine_... Saren who'd been _augmented_ by Sovereign and betrayed everything he'd promised to protect...though the betrayal seemed to have begun long before the augmentation.

"Cause and effect in a hell of mess," she rasped aloud. Her voice echoed through the loft, reverberated off her spine and made her shiver.

Saren who'd been working with ExoGeni...who'd been involved with experiments on Thorian Creepers and Rachni...both of which she'd found lurking in bases associated with Cerberus.

Coincidence was a funny thing, and could be a powerful force indeed, but...but this seemed a bit too symmetrical, a bit too planned, to be nothing more than coincidence. And that terrified her beyond belief.

Because if Cerberus had ties to Saren...and Saren had ties to the Reapers...well... that was a seriously tangled web. _And the more I fight it, the more trapped in it I seem to become. _

Her heart was still pounding. She was beginning to feel faint-but-definite tremors of it through her head, a sensation Kaidan had mentioned more than once, and one that-all empathy aside-she'd never had the slightest desire to experience.

More irritating than the incipient migraine, however, was the lurking knowledge that they'd be arriving at Omega station in a few hours. Neither the Illusive Man nor his dossiers had led her to believe she'd need to be combat-ready just to approach a couple of recruits...but neither the Illusive Man nor his dossiers had led her to believe she should expect anything other than a fight.

And...in her experience, everything was a fight. Every. Goddamn. Thing.

"Life," she informed herself, rubbing her temples, "is war." Her fingers dipped down over her eyebrow...and the thin scar bisecting it wasn't there, not anymore. _One I've already lost. _

Light flickered at the corners of her vision.

She kicked her feet free of the blankets.

"Shepard?" EDI queried before she could speak. "Are you unwell? You seem agitated."

"Unwell?" Shepard repeated sardonically. She rolled her eyes and immediately wished she hadn't. Damn, but that hurt. "Yeah. You could say that."

"Are you in need of assistance?" EDI's consideration might be nothing more than programming, yet another reminder of Cerberus' interest in protecting their _investment_, but Shepard couldn't quite squelch a slight twinge of guilt. If Shepard hated or feared what she had become, that was hardly EDI's fault. The AI was only doing her job, and doing it well...something Shepard normally would have approved.

And, oddly enough, the AI had just offered her the very thing she wanted.

"Actually, EDI, that's not such a bad idea." she said slowly. "I doubt I'm in any immediate danger, but I would like Doctor Chakwas' opinion."

"Very well, Shepard."

"Uh-EDI? At her convenience. There's no need to wake her up or anything."

Shepard eased back onto her pillows and closed her eyes, determined to put the problem of herself aside until Chakwas could look her over and assess the risk. She could be Chakwas' problem, at least temporarily, but Omega station and whatever challenges it might bring would be hers to address, and-come hell or highwater-she was going to set foot on that station rested, refreshed, and ready for whatever it might-whatever it _would_-throw at her.

She'd just begun to relax when the door to the loft hissed open.

She jerked upright, snatching the pistol from her nightstand and training it on the door in one smooth motion as swiftly and naturally as taking a breath.

"I doubt you invited me up here just to shoot me," Chakwas observed. Shepard thought-not for the first time-that the dry good cheer in the doctor's voice was as soothing as a good dose of medigel.

"EDI-"

"Didn't wake me," Chakwas interrupted smoothly. "And helping you is hardly what I would call inconvenient, Commander. Didn't I tell you it was exactly what I'd been missing?"

"Well, in that case," Shepard dropped the pistol back onto the nightstand with a clatter, "it's about damn time you got here."

"Oh, Shepard," Chakwas chuckled. "I have missed you."

"Thanks for coming," Shepard added, inscrutably polite, which only increased the apparent amusement of the doctor.

"My pleasure," the doctor assured her, more amused than ever. "Now. What seems to be bothering you? Is the implants?"

"After a manner of speaking," Shepard returned. "I'm not sure it's the smartest thing I've ever done, asking you where we're under obvious surveillance..." Shepard shot a look at the empty space where EDI's blue avatar had been not long before, "but...considering I wouldn't even have made it out of that damned research facility if Miranda hadn't been watching every step I took, Cerberus already knows I took as many of their files as I could manage...And I made a point of telling Miranda, Jacob, and that damned creepy excuse of holographic man that I don't trust them...and would love any excuse _not _to cooperate...so, really, if I didn't ask, they'd only be disappointed...Doctor...just how much of myself am I? Really? What did they do to me?"


	11. The Best Bridge

**Note: **Thanks again to all the people who've taken time to encourage me by adding me or my story to favorites. And, most especially, thanks to those few who've written reviews. Your interest and support is always appreciated, and often instrumental to maintaining the inspiration necessary to develop a story.

**Chapter Title: **The best bridge between despair and hope is a good night's sleep. ~E. Joseph Cossman

* * *

A dark shape passed over the window like a rock rolled before a tomb. Shepard shuddered violently, confused by the image, confused by her reaction to it. And then realization dawned.

The gunship.

Garrus must have realized it, too. He was scrabbling back for cover even as she drew breath to warn him.

She wasn't fast enough, and neither was he.

A hail of bullets thudded over him.

The room went silent, as if sound had been severed from it. The silence grasped her by the throat like an old nemesis; the death of sound, the sound of death.

Garrus righted himself, staggered toward cover.

Sound returned with a roar, a sound worse than silence. Worse than death...well, worse than her death, at least.

"No, Garrus!" she screamed, or she tried to, but she couldn't breathe. There was no air. Her throat was tight...with fear or grief...maybe both...her chest burned.

Time slowed.

Garrus fell to the floor, but the floor was moving, spiraling out from under her feet. She was falling...falling...lost...

She'd failed. Again. She didn't want to live with the consequences.

And she wasn't about to give Tarak the satisfaction of allowing him to live with them, either. He might have defeated them; he might have killed Garrus, and destroyed her fledgling sense of surviving self, but he hadn't won. And he wasn't going to win. She wasn't about to let him. She wasn't going to fail Garrus that far. She wasn't going to fail him again. Not ever again.

Completely oblivious to Miranda's attempt to reach out and pull her to safety, Shepard vaulted up and over the couch offering her and Garrus some poor cover with one hand, ripping the missile launcher from its slot in her armor with the other. Her feet hadn't even touched the ground when she began to fire, pounding off four shots in quick succession without much caring where-or what-they hit.

The gunship broke into a ball of fire, shrapnel pounded off the bridge and walls, rained into the windows.

Shepard later discovered she had slapped the missile-launcher back into place through sheer habit...she might have thrown the it aside for all she knew at the time...She skidded over to Garrus, dropping down beside him.

He was still, so still.

Emotion crushed in on her from all sides. She felt suffocated.

She had some vague idea of closing his eyes in benediction.

She reached out to touch him in farewell as he hadn't allowed her to touch him in greeting.

Her hand was shaking.

Some small part of her that passed for rational observed that would make it considerably harder to put a bullet in her own cold, dead, brain. The rest of her didn't even register her own irritation. She swayed slightly, dizzy. Her fingers dipped, brushed warm, rough plating.

Garrus gasped, a deep gurgling breath.

"Garrus!" she cried, pleading, exulting, commanding.

He opened an eye, his hand grasping reflexively for the barrel of his rifle. In that moment, one small, pain-dulled blue orb held all eternity.

Miranda crowded in close, running her omni-tool over the turian, keying in the most efficacious applications of medi-gel as quickly as she could.

"Garrus," Shepard breathed. "Stay with me." Her omni-tool glowed to life. "Joker," she rasped. "We are in need of emergency medical evac."

Jacob pressed in close, too, studying the turian for the best places to apply pressure and help slow the bleeding. "He looks bad," Jacob murmured to Miranda.

Shepard's head snapped back and she glared in a way that made them both stiffen. "_Now_, Joker," Shepard hissed.

She didn't hear Joker's reply.

Jacob had to bump her with his shoulder before she noticed the shuttle had arrived, hovering at the window with its door ajar.

Doctor Chakwas was leaning out, offering them a low, thin stretcher.

She wasn't sure if she helped her team Garrus onto the stretcher or not. She was barely aware of shifting to the side a bit, just enough to let Miranda activate the stretcher's hover capabilities. Miranda and Jacob guided the stretcher to the window. Shepard followed, her whole body strangely numb.

"Garrus," she murmured, twining her fingers through his around the barrel of his rifle until they were all inextricably entangled.

"Garrus?" Chakwas repeated. She would never have recognized him. In spite of years in service to the Alliance-she hadn't really learned to easily differentiate one turian from another, but she'd spent a lot of time patching holes in the hide of one Garrus Vakarian. She should have recognized him. "He doesn't look good."

"Tell me about it," Jacob agreed as the shuttle door opened. "And she doesn't look much better," he muttered darkly.

Startled, Doctor Chakwas glanced up from her patient. And stared in surprise.

Shepard knew it was best to pick the person with the right skills for the job, then stand back and let them do it. She was standing back now; she didn't try to interfere, but even standing off to the side, she hovered.

And Shepard never hovered.

Her face was more drawn than Chakwas had ever seen it, and she had seen it after Shepard had taken some pretty terrible hits. Her previously faint scars were raw and livid, crackling under her pale skin, all but sparking where they intersected other lines, dull and silvery like the tracks of tears. The edges of Shepard's grey eyes were limned in red, the pupils so shiny they looked like the flare of an exploding drive core.

As Jacob moved the stretcher away from her, tugging Garrus' hand from her grasp, Shepard wound her hands together, pulling them in opposite directions with such unthinking violence Chakwas was afraid she would snap a finger.

Jacob looked past them both, to Miranda. Miranda gave him a nod in answer, a nod only someone who knew her as well as he did would recognize as a nod at all.

As Shepard emerged from the shuttle, following the stretcher almost blindly, Miranda reached out and touched her shoulder. Grasped her shoulder, actually. Firmly.

Shepard jumped. "Get away from me," she snapped, wheeling toward Miranda as if to strike. "Get..." She waved her arms in wildly, "over there. _You-_you_-fixed_ me. So get over there and be of some _use_...fix..._him_..." Her head lulled forward and her eyebrows went up. Her eyes narrowed. betternnew..." she slurred fiercely, but heavily. For a moment it seemed as though she was about to say something else, then she slumped heavily into Miranda's arms.

Miranda eased her to the cargo bay floor with surprising gentleness. "Jacob, why don't you escort the Commander to her quarters?" She said almost conversationally as she slid the empty hypodermic injector back into her belt. "I'll accompany the doctor and her patient. I believe," she added, her voice cool with irony, "I'll..._get over there_ and see if my skills might be _of use_."


	12. Controlled Crashing

**Note: **All standard disclaimers still apply. Thanks again to all the people who've taken time to encourage me by adding me or my story to favorites. And, most especially, thanks to those few who've written reviews. Your interest and support is always appreciated, and often instrumental to maintaining the inspiration necessary to develop a story.

**Chapter-Specific Note:** This takes place on one of the very first ground-side missions in ME1. I don't necessarily have a specific mission in mind. Yet, anyway. This chapter doesn't so much end as quit. I envision it eventually expanding to the end of the battle, maybe some discussion of Akuze, but I don't have an ETA on when that might happen.

* * *

"Where in the realm in the of all the restless spirits did you learn to drive?" Garrus demanded indignantly.

At least, he tried.

He suspected he mostly managed to sound relieved. But traveling a few miles without jumps, jolts, flips, or bounces was more than worth the sacrifice of a little dignity.

"It's not so much driving as controlled crashing," Alenko observed, casting a sidelong glance in Shepard's direction. "Or an attempt to control a crash, at any rate," he elaborated with an odd, lilting note in his voice. It was a note Shepard's voice often carried, but that his own almost never did. "But even Shepard couldn't hit so much as a bump in this wide, flat open plain."

"Nothing the size of a pebble in sight, and thank the spirits of the place for that," Garrus sighed, sagging back against his seat.

Shepard wrenched the Mako into a hairpin turn so tight even her own head snapped.

Kaidan and Garrus reached up to rub the backs of their respective necks almost in sync, as if the entire move was some elaborate battle maneuver they were practicing.

Garrus was surprised Shepard hadn't reached up to rub her neck as well. She had to want to-in fact, he thought he saw the muscles in her shoulder quiver slightly, as if she were willfully suppressing a movement she'd begun to make without thinking, but that could have just been an odd optical reaction to another jerk of the Mako that sent them careening off.

"Akuze," She said tightly.

"Ak-uh-what?" Garrus sputtered, fighting the urge to dig his talons into the gunnery control panel some desperately inane attempt to keep himself upright. "My translator is making an escape attempt. Is that some sort of human response to a rhetorical question or something?"

But even as he said it, he realized Alenko had somehow managed to go unnaturally still. Which in the wildly-bouncing Mako, was really quite an impressive accomplishment. Alenko was staring at Shepard, which was more-or-less standard operating procedure, but his expression did seem to be a bit...

"Talk later," Shepard grunted a bit tartly. Garrus had never imagined Shepard and his father might have anything in common, but that particular tone was one he'd always assumed his father had invented. "Shoot now," she added helpfully, twirling the Mako into another gizzard-twisting side-spin.

"Shoot?" Garrus repeated as the view outside the Mako whirled into chaos. "Shoot what exactly? The sky?"

"No." The word wasn't Shepard's, it was Alenko's, soft and somber. He'd stopped staring at Shepard and started craning his neck about to look out the windows, as if he was trying to catch a glimpse of some particularly important landmark.

Shepard's driving was so bad, the very ground beneath had begun to tremble. Garrus didn't blame it.

Shepard flung the Mako into reverse, slamming Garrus into the gunnery console.

"Sorry," she said, not sounding it in the least, and pulled hard to port. "But would you _please_ just _shoot_!"

Garrus reacted to the commanding tone of her voice instinctively, slamming his hand down onto the controls without the slightest idea what he was doing.

A missile arced from the gun, solidly impacting... "What in the names of all the ancestors-" Garrus pressed his hands into the panel, levering himself up for a better look. The guns tattooed rapidly in response, spraying bullets like the geysers in the Presidium fountain sprayed water.

"Thresher Maw," Alenko gasped.

"That's better," Shepard sang out, slamming her foot onto the accelerator in lieu of punctuation. "_Thank you!_"

"Uh...Shepard," Garrus said, reluctant to refuse her praise, but figuring they'd all be better off if she knew the score, "I'm afraid I'm not actually aiming at anything. It's...uh...kind of hard to get a target lock-"

"That's the idea," Shepard agreed chirpily, spinning the Mako like a top.

And narrowly avoiding a splash of some very vile green liquid the worm-like erupting out of the smooth, quiet had spat at them.

"Kaidan-"

"Standing by to slap omni-gel on any leaks in the vessel, m'am," he said smoothly. His unruffled manner always made Garrus want to shake him up a bit just to see if anything came loose. Garrus suspected it annoyed Wrex equally, if not to an even greater degree, but, if so, the krogan routinely exerted an amount of control widely believed to be contrary to the nature of his species. "Seeing as how I'm temporarily relieved of navigational duties." In defiance of all things likely, that lilting tone seemed to be creeping back into the LT's voice.

Shepard's lips twitched and her head might have turned the merest fraction in Alenko's direction. She mumbled, as near as Garrus could tell over the bone-jarring vibrations of the Thresher Maw's pursuit, the more immediate rumble of the Mako's guns, and the crash of a haphazardly-aimed missile impacting..._something_, "that's my...that's, 'atta boy."


	13. Along the Solitary Plain

**Note: **All standard disclaimers still apply. Thanks again to all the people who've taken time to encourage me by adding me or my story to favorites. And, most especially, thanks to those few who've written reviews. Your interest and support is always appreciated, and often instrumental to maintaining the inspiration necessary to develop a story.

**Chapter Title:** See quote within the text. Also, note similarity to line in Sayers' translation _Inferno, _which I paraphrase from memory as: "Midway this way of life we're bound upon, I woke to find myself in a dark wood, where the right way was wholly lost and gone." Less directly connected, but also of interest for this story as a whole may be the inscription on the gates of hell: _Abandon hope all ye who enter here._

**Chapter-specific Notes: **Takes place directly following _Parts Answering Parts _Chapter 8: _Two Pains_.

I think there will eventually be a scene directly following this one as well, but that may change as the story develops.

A recap of Chapter 8 may be helpful: Shepard has refused to take Garrus into the Omega Quarantine zone and has ordered him back to the ship as Acting XO. Also, as is mentioned in the story text, very little time (probably less than 24 hours) has passed between Garrus' (partial) recovery and the start of this next mission.

Williams may have had the Indoctrinated in mind when she spoke of Purgatory, or Saren's determination to believe he'd betrayed the Council in order to save some scrap of life in the universe, or perhaps even (most likely?) her own desire to reclaim the family honor. This may or may not become more clear to us as the story progresses. ;-)

Purgatorio quotes are from the Longfellow translation of Dante's _Purgatorio_ and can be found at this link: .

* * *

Williams had once described an odd place where the spirits of human dead gathered to wait for many years and were punished for their misdeeds in life in order to be free of them before moving on to the eternity beyond. _I've shown him all the people of perdition/ And now those spirits I intend to show/ Who purge themselves beneath thy guardianship. (1.66)_, she'd said, reciting part of a poem. She'd had to explain so the quote would make sense...and he wasn't sure it did, even then.

But it did now.

Omega had begun to explain it to him, perhaps better than he'd liked. Not just in the lives the of the people he saw there,suffering every day, but in the way he'd appointed himself their guardian, as if doing something, anything, remotely good, would somehow make things right. Somehow provide him with enough wisdom and experience to find a way to make the Council reconsider. To force them to stop hiding behind their regulations and their rules and face the facts. About the Reapers. About justice. About Shepard.

He'd let her walk away without him once, and he'd been left behind.

_Along the solitary plain we went / as one who unto the lost road returns,/ and till he finds it seems to go in vain. (1.120), _he could almost hear Williams making yet another of her sardonic observations over his shoulder.

Williams was right.

He'd tried to catch up, tried to follow the Commander as he always had, off into the mists of time and, by some impossible act of the spirits, she'd turned back into the clear blue present, pulling him along with her.

But now, standing in the airlock of a ship that was and was not the one to which he'd longed to return, he couldn't help feeling fear in every hollow of his bones.

She'd walked away. He'd let her walk away, and he'd be left behind. Again. Maybe this time for good. The spirits tended to get vengeful when they felt their gifts weren't being properly appreciated, after all. Not that he could blame them.

His fear superseded the shock of seeing her again at all, against all the odds.

And as shock ebbed, pain was setting in.

The pain of losing her.

The pain of losing the only cause he'd ever been allowed to fight for as well as believe in...

And the pain of losing his team.

His failure, his fault...that had certainly taught him something of how the great and burning desire to atone could become so visceral, so immediate, so tangible, that it trapped you and held you more tightly than the best restraints C-Sec had ever devised.

_The blow so great, that they despaired of pardon. (1.11-2)_ He heard Williams speak the words like a benediction. Soberly, somberly. Maybe even tenderly.

The expression on Shepard's face as she gazed through the viewport at the blazing light that spread and pooled beneath them on Virmire and throughout the first few days that followed flickered through his memory, dousing his anger at her refusal to let him follow her into quick and sputtering death.

His urge to turn and run after her in defiance of her orders remained, but...he'd already sacrificed more than enough dignity for the day.

And for all the days to come.

He had no idea how he was going to make amends.

A red-headed woman was waiting for him just inside the airlock.

Garrus was no expert on human expressions, but he had the impression that hers was almost unnaturally warm and friendly. It made him feel rather like a pyjak being greeted by a varren.

"Officer Vakarian?" She thrust a hand toward him. "Kelly Chambers. Commander Shepard's Yeoman."

Garrus eyed her hand warily, trying to remember what the gesture meant, then snatched it a bit precipitately as he remembered. He was supposed to clasp it in his own hand and jiggle it a bit- "shake" he believed the humans called it. An odd ritual by way of greeting, if you asked him, but, of course, no one had.

"I don't suppose the Commander has had time to mention me yet," the woman added, a trifle awkwardly, though that might just have been because his _shake_ seemed to have thrown her a bit off-balance. "She hasn't had a chance to tell me much about you, either, but I'm very happy to see you."

"Happy?" Garrus repeated, confused. Shepard hadn't seemed particularly happy to have him back on her team when she was ordering him back onto the _Normandy_, and even if she was happy to have him keeping an eye on the ship, why would this woman care? She didn't even know him. She probably couldn't tell him apart from any other turian in Omega.

Maybe it was just nostalgia, but he didn't remember having this much trouble understanding the human crew-let alone the Commander-the last time he was on the _Normandy_. On _**a**__ Normandy_. He _had _to be hallucinating. Dementia had set in. The end was nigh.

At least he'd gotten to see Shepard again, though if anyone had asked him ahead of time, he'd never have guessed this would be how he'd imagine their reunion. So maybe it was real? If so, that missile must have scrambled his senses.

Oh. The missile.

"Ah. Yeah, I think I owe Dr. Chakwas for that."

"What?" The Yeoman looked nearly as confused as Garrus felt. "Oh. Your injuries." Her expression cleared, though it still looked a bit...inquisitive. "I'm sure seeing you well is all the thanks Dr. Chakwas wants or needs. We're all very pleased she and Operative Lawson were able to save your life, though, of course, we wish we'd been able to prevent your injuries in the first place, but I don't know how Commander Shepard and her team could have gotten to you any sooner.

"I mean, the Commander had barely been back from the dead for a day before she was asking The Illusive Man where you were. She's had me scouring space with a toothbrush, looking for you, ever since she arrived on board. I was beginning to think Alliance High Command would call me out for treason if I so much as wrote another letter. Come to that, they probably still will..." she trailed off, "Unless..." she paused hopefully... "I don't suppose you're still in touch with Lt. Alenko?"

"Staff _Commander _Alenko," Garrus corrected.

"Ah." Garrus wasn't entirely sure he liked the way those laser-bright green eyes seemed to bore into him, unearthing events-and feelings-he'd thought gone and buried.

The red-head waited just long enough for it to be uncomfortably apparent he had no intention of volunteering any information to fill the silence. "So...Commander Shepard left you in charge of a ship you haven't really seen yet, right? I'd be happy to show you around."

Garrus wasn't at all sure he'd _be happy_ to spend that much more time with this bright, brittle female, but if he didn't do _something_, he'd go mad waiting on Shepard to return, wondering whether or not she'd died...again, wondering why she'd left him here, wondering if he'd imagined the whole unlikely thing...not that seeing the ship could really confirm the reality for him, but at least it would be a distraction...


	14. A Few Bumps

**Note: **All standard disclaimers still apply. Thanks again to all the people who've taken time to encourage me by adding me or my story to favorites. And, most especially, thanks to those few who've written reviews. Your interest and support is always appreciated, and often instrumental to maintaining the inspiration necessary to develop a story.

**Chapter-Specific Note:** This chapter is a continuation of _Parts Answering Parts_, Chapter 12: _Controlled Crashing_, and takes place on one of the very first ground-side missions in ME1. I don't necessarily have a specific mission in mind. Yet, anyway.

* * *

The next fifteen or twenty minutes seemed like fifteen or twenty years.

By the time the huge, hairy, worm-like Thresher Maw gave a final bellowing roar and collapsed, flailing and flopping across the ground like a water hose unexpectedly disconnected from the output valve, Shepard and Alenko both had beads of moisture collecting across their foreheads.

It was a mystery to Garrus where all that moisture could even come from. He felt as hot and dry as a desert, the plates on his forehead expanding and contracting in a vain attempt to vent his adrenaline-amped body temperature as he drew breath in exhausted, warbling bursts.

Shepard and Alenko were panting, too, a low, harsh sound that grated on Garrus' nerves.

Shepard looked around, her normally pink-tinted face pale. "Everybody in one piece?"

Garrus bobbed his head in affirmation, noting-vaguely, but not for the first time-how odd and convenient it was that humans used a similar gesture in the same manner...sometimes, particularly lately, he found himself musing over the bitter irony that two cultures who met for the first time in brief-but-furious battle due to miscommunication should have so many similar gestures for the purpose of communication.

"Thanks to you, Commander," Alenko said soberly, still sounding winded.

"Commander," Garrus said inquisitively, the question emerging with the slow, deliberate shape of the word, "how did you know?"

Shepard sighed, reaching up to rub her shoulder, rolling it as if it ached. There was something...distant...about the motions, as if she did them by habit, rather than because she had managed to wrench her shoulder against the safety harness in the course of the Mako's wild gyrations. "Akuze," she repeated.

None of the other humans Garrus had worked with had ever used this word to answer questions, rhetorical or otherwise. He tilted his head almost imperceptibly, his lips barely parted to ask-

"It's an answer, Garrus," she said, "but...only because it answers your questions."

Alenko made a sputtering sound that might have been laughter, or might only have been the liquid from his canteen going down wrong.

"Commander?" Garrus could feel his mandibles twitch with a reaction somewhere in between confusion and consternation. Was he missing something obvious? Was Alenko making fun of him? Was Shepard? They both seemed like intelligent officers. Why would they undermine team morale that way? He'd worked with humans before, not often, and not over long periods of time, but enough so that he'd thought he was reasonably competent at understanding them...though, he suddenly remembered he'd felt unsure of that the moment Shepard had stared him down in Dr. Michel's clinic.

Shepard, watching him, shook her head. "I mean it's not a word most humans use to answer questions," she explained. "It's the name of a planet. Actually, I sort of expected you to recognize it."

"There are a lot of planets in the galaxy, Commander," Garrus said mildly, pleased to note that his voice was smooth and steady in spite of the jolt of sheepish shame that sparked through him. Of course, it was the reaction any self-respecting turian would expect to have at the thought of disappointing his commander's expectations. But Garrus had long thought he was no good at meeting expectations...especially when it came to his reactions. Weird, how a handful of days among a few dozen humans could make him feel more fundamentally turian than all his years in the service, or all his father's nagging. He wasn't sure, yet, though, whether the idea worried or amused or pleased him... "I stopped trying to keep track of them all quite a while back. The only planets I know anything about are the ones involved in whatever it is I happen to be investigating."

Shepard paused to take the canteen Alenko held out in invitation, touched the Lieutenant's now-empty hand, briefly, with the very tips of her fingers, a gesture Garrus assumed-given the context of the situation-to be of gratitude, took a violent swig at the canteen, handed it back to its owner, and wiped the back of her forearm across her mouth.

"A sensible attitude," she reflected. "Akuze is one planet I wish I knew nothing about."

"I can see why," Garrus said ruefully, "it you encountered one of those monstrosities."

Alenko made that odd, choking-laugh sound again. "Not one, Garrus. Several."

"What? At once? How did-" Garrus broke off suddenly, horribly aware of the words he hadn't spoken, not quite, echoing in his ears. From the looks of what he took to be discomfort on their faces, Shepard and Alenko could hear them, too.

"Barely. Just barely," Shepard said grimly, rolling her shoulder again, so violently it was apt to do more harm than good.

"It was-" Alenko broke off and looked at Shepard. Shepard nodded, rubbing at her shoulder. Alenko watched her for a minute, his dark eyes inscrutable, then turned his attention more fully to Garrus. "There was-is-a human colony on Akuze. One of the settlements on the outskirts of the colony proper had gone completely silent, and people were worried, thinking it might be a batarian raid. Shepard's unit was sent in to investigate."

"The settlement was a mess," Shepard said, rolling her shoulder again. "Looked like an earthquake had hit it... walls half-gone, stuff strewn everywhere. But there were no bodies. We decided-well, I guess I decided...I was in charge. It was-it was my fault." She shook herself slightly, like a turian trying to ease some muscles after a particularly strenuous sparring bout. "I decided we should sift through the rubble, try to find some sort of indication as to where the settlers had gone. We were at it most of the day... the team was tired, but I was determined not to request pick-up, not until I had some sort of answers, something to offer our superiors."

Alenko reached out and put his hand on her shoulder, perhaps to offer comfort, perhaps just to keep her from developing a repetitive stress injury. She turned toward him, looked at him without any indication of seeing anything.

"We were setting up camp when the ground started to shake."

"On foot?" Garrus interjected, horrified, then subsided under Alenko's positively thunderous look.

"On foot," Shepard confirmed. "I was still thinking of earthquakes, though I don't really know why. My first thought was to get away from the buildings, so we wouldn't be buried inside if they collapsed. I told the men to head for higher ground. We were scrambling up this steep, rocky incline when the first Thresher erupted out of the ground behind us. We were all still gaping at it like it was a some sort of visitation from the divine when the damn thing spit. The acid ate the face off the guy beside me. Literally. He didn't have time to scream. I suppose that was a small blessing... for me, I mean, not for him. If he'd screamed, I'd never stop hearing him-"

Using the hand cupping her far shoulder, Alenko pulled her closer to him, as if offering her the shelter of his larger frame. She seemed to resist for a moment, then relaxed into the momentum he'd created, allowing herself to lean against him. She rested in the lee of his body, looking tired and drained.

"That's how I got this, " she added, reaching up to touch the break in the center of one of the arches over her eyes. "I think. The doctors thought for months I might lose my eye. But I beat the odds. I'm good at that, I guess."

"Commander," Alenko said, his voice surprisingly gentle.

Shepard shook her head. "No, Kaidan. It's okay. I'm okay." Still leaning on Alenko's shoulder, she continued, " Even though we made more obvious targets, the three of us on the hill-face had better luck than the three behind us. More Threshers erupted up and out, biting men in half, swallowing them whole. Wrapping them in their coils. I can't really tell you what happened-it's just a confusion of images, all blurred with a a kind of red haze-from the blood in my eyes, I suppose?

"Anyway, we ran, taking cover behind anything we could. We learned the hard way that even walls don't stop that spit...one of the guys was hit in the gut. We didn't have enough medigel, but even if we had, it wouldn't have done any good, not without some way to get that acid off of him. He died while we were trying to stabilize him enough so we could move him. In retrospect, stopping at all was kind of foolhardy, under the circumstances, with those things on our heels, but I'd do it again. I hope the other guy-his name was Toombs-would too, but I'd have to ask him and, of course, I can't."

She lapsed into silence.

Garrus stared at Alenko. Alenko stared back. Shepard stared into space without noticing.

"With the wall gone, we could see that the structure was some sort of mining garage. And there was an armored car, equipped with a mining laser and some blasting caps. We didn't have a wounded man to move, but we figured we had as good a chance in that car as on foot, so we got in anyway. It was Toombs who realized... the whole time we'd been running, those damn worms never came up under rock... and the rocks we'd hidden behind hadn't melted the way those walls did.

"We circled back around...to look for survivors, to get some payback, six of one, half a dozen of the other. We didn't see any trace of the men we'd left behind-the acid is probably to thank for that-but we managed to kill three or four of those worms, before we hit the jolt-I lost control of the car-" she laughed, possibly at the expression, "The way I drive may be like crashing, but it is _definitely_ under control. Except that it wasn't. Not for that split second. And that was enough. I wrenched the wheel back around. The front tires were back on the rock. And that frigging worm came up underneath us, under the back tires. Took the gunnery station right out of the back, caught up in that damned fringe around its head. Don't know if it meant to or not."

Garrus, who had been beginning to feel more comfortable, suddenly felt as though he might spontaneously combust. He looked around his station and patted the seat under him with a nervous talon, grateful Alenko seemed to be watching Shepard, grateful Shepard didn't seem to notice. She was still talking, almost to herself, as if narrating a nightmare.

"I dropped out of the harness, crawled through a window and got the ridge between us. I just watched that damn thing, trying to figure out what to do, how to get the car seat away from it...

"I wasn't even sure whether or not it was worth it. If there was any residual acid in that fringe, well... Toombs was already dead. I probably would have died, standing there debating over a dead man, only the remaining ordinance in the car decided to explode. Went off close enough to the Maw to give it a good scare, and _whoosh_, the whole damn thing is rushing past me like a freight train to nowhere. It went underground, taking that seat and whatever was left of Toombs with it."

And whenever she was on a planet, whenever she was near flat ground, she kept waiting on it to return and finish the job. But...she kept going groundside, anyway, and when a Thresher did appear, she'd kept her cool and saved herself and her team into the bargain. Garrus couldn't quite believe it, and he was willing to bet Alenko couldn't either.

There was a long and profound silence.

It seemed as long-or longer-than the attack itself had.

"Well," Shepard said, pulling herself upright. "The way I drive may take some getting used to, but-mark my words-you'll learn to love it. It keeps things interesting. What's life without a few bumps?"


	15. Borrowed Time

**Note: **All standard disclaimers still apply. Thanks again to all the people who've taken time to encourage me by adding me or my story to favorites. And, most especially, thanks to those few who've written reviews. Your interest and support is always appreciated, and often instrumental to maintaining the inspiration necessary to develop a story.

* * *

Garrus was checking the Mako for damage from the hot-and-fast ride into the STG base camp when he heard the elevator.

Confused, he turned to see Shepard stepping through the doors, almost more quickly than they could whisper open. She strode past, so focused on her destination he doubted she'd even seen him or even realized she wasn't alone in the hold.

Strode up to the armory station, the station Williams had occupied every day-shift since Garrus had joined the squad.

He watched, all-but-seeing Williams standing there eyeing Shepard with a wry smirk, as Shepard fiddled with several tools on the workstation.

Shepard paused, her hand hovering over the computer interface Garrus had seen playing messages from Willliams' family, and sighed heavily, her shoulders beginning to slump. Her hand dropped, clutching something on the table so tightly Garrus thought he could see the strain in her bare knuckles.

"Garrus." Shepard spoke without turning around, her voice weary. "Care to join me for a drink?

Garrus had no idea what to say.

So he moved without speaking, a few long strides bringing him to her side.

Shepard stayed as she was, clutching the bottle.

Garrus waited silently, until the silence began to take on a weight he could feel pressing down into his shoulders.

Slowly, wondering if he was stepping out of line, he reached over and gently tugged the bottle from her grasp.

Shepard made a faint sound. Protest? Grief? Gratitude? All of the above? None of them?

Garrus just didn't know.

Shepard didn't move, so he looked around for glasses, mostly so he wasn't looking at her instead. Locating them behind the a box of various components, he relocated them to the front of the table with a faint clink that made Shepard wince, and splashed liquid into them.

She'd picked up her glass before he'd set the bottle down, so Garrus picked up his glass, too, still watching, still uncertain.

Shepard raised her glass in a gesture Garrus had begun to recognize after a few group outings to Flux. She was proposing a toast.

He raised his glass too. "To...Ashley?" He suggested, hesitant, trying to scope the situation that had already enmeshed him.

Shepard's eyes sparked. "To borrowed time," she said softly, and clinked the rim of her glass to the rim of his.

She kicked the drink back in one smooth shot. Garrus met the motion and matched it. The glasses thunked back onto the solid surface of the workstation.

Shepard rolled her shoulder, rubbed the back of her neck. Waved a hand at the bottle.

Garrus splayed his arms slightly, arched his spine in a subtle turian shrug, and poured.

Shepard picked up the glass, swirled the contents, set it down with a sigh. "So, Vakarian, have I ever told you where I picked up my dead-eye?"

It was in N7 training that she'd really learned to snipe.

She'd taken to the sniper rifle like a duck to water, with all the wonder and relief of a captive but wild animal returning to its natural environment. The rifle was heavy, it was awkward, it was slow... but it was powerful, and it both granted and required absolutely iron control. Power and control... two things she'd felt absolutely bereft of from the moment she set foot on Akuze. Two things she'd thought by the end she'd never reclaim again. Important things. Things she never took for granted now, but greeted each time she looked through her scope with a sense of immeasurable relief. A gratitude for survival, for choice. The ability not to be a helpless victim, but to act. To protect oneself, and even others. To survive.

Shepard was damn good at it. She took pride in it.

All soldiers had some basic training with a sniper rifle. It was part of their basic training. But most of them never progressed past the most basic competency, the barest understanding of the weapon. Most of them preferred quick and ugly. And why shouldn't they? It was how they were trained to think, what they were trained to _be_.

Sometimes, even before Akuze, Shepard desperately wished she could give in to that training, let it wash over her. She didn't _want _to think.

After Akuze, well...

Then she _really_ didn't want to think.

She'd grown up in space. She was used to feeling small, insignificant. Or so she'd believed. It was Akuze that had shown her just how mistaken she she was.

After Akuze, she felt powerless.

She'd been bound to learn her limitations sometime, though she wished her unit hadn't been the price she'd paid for the lesson.

But their lives made it valuable.

She knew it was an accident, an odd quirk of fate, that she had walked away. Not unscathed, not unmarked, but alive. Barely.

Anderson had been the one to pull her off that rock, and he claimed it wasn't luck. At least, not exclusively. It was adaptability. And perseverance. And...well...

Whatever it was, they were agreed on one thing. It set her apart from her fellows. She wasn't just rank-and-file. Not anymore. Not after that.

She never knew for sure if she'd gotten into elite training on her own merits, or if Anderson had pulled some strings.

But she did know that the challenge of earning her stripes saved her sanity just as surely as Anderson's timely arrival had saved her skin.

She never forgot it.

He probably knew it, too, but he never gave any indication.

She never forgot that, either.

Borrowed time. In a way, Ash had been living on it since Eden Prime...and Shepherd had been living on it since Akuze.

After Akuze, she'd promised herself-never again. Never again.

For while, she thought she'd succeeded.

And then she and her team had gone groundside on Virmire.


	16. Now and Then

**Note: **All standard disclaimers still apply. Thanks again to all the people who've taken time to encourage me by adding me or my story to favorites. And, most especially, thanks to those few who've written reviews. Your interest and support is always appreciated, and often instrumental to maintaining the inspiration necessary to develop a story.

**Chapter-Specific Notes**: Takes place as part of the scene on Horizon. Directly precedes _Parts Answering Parts_ Chapters Two and Three. I may expand on this in another fragment later. Or not. I guess we'll see what develops.

* * *

It wasn't the first time Alenko had questioned her judgement.

He'd questioned her after Virmire, too.

Questioned, hell, Garrus had seen varren attacks that looked less aggressive.

Garrus wasn't cursed with eiditic memory, but he'd known even then—after Virmire—that the look on Shepard's face would never leave him...and it never had.

It visited him in the cold lonely moments when he'd realized and forgotten and realized again that she was dead and gone...her memory and her accomplishments forgotten and disrespected, all-but-erased...visited him with a sudden, cold clarity that cut him deeply, so deeply it had never ceased to bleed...just what she must have been feeling to put that look on her face in the first place...

The memory, that memory that never left him, imposed itself over the here and now...over her now...memory and expression mingled until Garrus had no hope of knowing where one ended and the other began...It was vivid, so damn vivid he wondered how Alenko could possibly miss seeing it.

But if anything had triggered the memory of Virmire—or anything else—for Alenko, he was doing a good job of controlling his reaction.

The face then. In the Briefing Room. Pale, weary, drawn. Sunken grey eyes shadowed under hot, puffy lids...hollow as if gutted by a great, burning regret, but, still, somehow, lit with something pained...something pleading. The jaw tense, teeth all-but-clenched. The forehead angled slightly down, as if her neck could no longer bear the effort it took to keep her chip up.

Garrus had hardly been able to bear those eyes...or even the memory of those eyes...and they hadn't even been looking at him.

If they had...

But they hadn't...he'd always felt a guilty relief over that.

And then she'd spoken...and with the memory of her words came the memory of her voice, and Garrus realized why he'd suddenly conjured that expression...that damned expression. Because while Shepherd wasn't wearing that look on her face, not now, that tone was in her voice...just a touch. Just a trace...just enough...

The tone was low, even, a little too calm with the faintest flat note of defeat. It was that note that had scared him then, after Virmire, that note that scared him now, on Horizon, that note that visited him in his worst dreams.

Her voice was husky, soft...almost pleading...vulnerable...and that was what unsettled him, what made him remember the tone, the words, the moment, the _expression_ with a combination of horror, tenderness and awe.

She'd underscored her own vulnerability then, there in the Briefing Room after Virmire, admitting in front of the whole damn squad that she couldn't have left Kaidan behind. She'd admitted it calmly, regretfully, but unapologetically. It was what it was, and it was a fact.

That was really one of the things that made her so remarkable—perhaps the most surprising, the most enduring, the most potent. She never refused to see things as they were. She called a spade a spade, and didn't waste time trying to call it anything else. She accepted what was, assessed what she had, and set about putting the spades in her hand to the best possible use. A spade allowed to perform its function without needless interference...well, the results spoke for themselves.

Oh, she'd told the truth as only she could tell it. She could never have left Kaidan behind...at least not without sacrificing a piece of herself, leaving a hole that would hurt...but...she'd lied, too, because that wasn't why she'd saved him.

And everyone in the room had known it. Or Garrus had thought they had anyway. Maybe he'd been wrong...whoever in the room had known, Alenko apparently hadn't.

Being who she was, Shepard had even essentially called her lie a lie, telling the truth with another simple statement of fact. "Ash was a damned good marine. The best."

As such, Ash knew as well as anyone that—as good as her skills were—they weren't as rare—nor as valuable—as Alenko's. Ash had made the choice herself when she'd armed that warhead, Alenko hadn't. Ash knew that would weigh with Shepherd, Garrus knew it, and Alenko had to know it, too.

That mattered.

Ash had been willing—maybe even a little eager—to die...to prove herself, to prove her family. Alenko, the crew, and the rest of the squad might or might not have known, but Shepard had...and so had Garrus...and that mattered, too.

Most of all, though, Shepard had lied in allowing Alenko to make it about himself...about Ash...about _them_...at all...because it wasn't about him, or Ash...It wasn't even about Shepard. It was about the salarians. If the ground team had fought back to Ash and the bomb, they might have saved one life. Fighting forward, they had saved a dozen. That wasn't a weakness, and it wasn't a mistake. Not to the salarians. Not to Shepard. And not to Garrus.

When he'd had time for the pain and shock to subside, Alenko might appreciate that, but in the midst of his grief, he wasn't ready to hear it.

And so Shepard had lied.

She offered up half the truth, sacrificed her dignity and pride on an altar of publicity, of rules broken and regs bent, to spare Alenko as much guilt as she could.

Garrus had seen that knowledge and the respect it engendered reflected in every single face around that room. And, at the time, he'd merely thought Kaidan Alenko was damned lucky...and he had better appreciate it...but now...now...he realized Alenko was a damned fool who'd never seen what was right in front of him, let alone deserved it.

Garrus couldn't understand it at all.

And something, some faint fissure flickering between her eyes, some unfamiliar line in the way she stood, made him think Shepard was having some trouble processing things herself.

She'd allowed her vulnerability to show, then, on Virimire, even underscored it. Now, here on Horizon, things were different. She did her best to camouflage her pain, armor it in determination and pride.

Her spine stiffened. Her chin came up. Her shoulders squared.

"You think the Council or the Alliance will even consider what I have to say?," she asked, the coolness in her voice offset with the faint trace of a nervous, humorless laugh. "Fat chance." She folded her arms across her chest, leaning back on the balls of her feet. She usually did that when she was relaxed, but now she looked anything but. "They never have before. You know that."

Alenko might have had the grace to look a bit taken aback. Something in his expression had shifted, but it was difficult to see beneath the hard, brittle shell of anger and outrage he wore like a mask. He turned sharply on his heel, the picture of military precision, and began to walk away.

"You didn't," Shepard added so quietly Garrus might have thought he'd imagined it, if he hadn't seen Alenko's step catch for the merest measure of a moment. Her voice was matter-of-fact, but the air around them felt bitter as the wind on Noveria.

Alenko took another step and another.

Shepard stood, still in that slightly-off version of her usual at-ease stance. Looking at her made Garrus uncomfortable. It made him want to... Well, he didn't know exactly. He just knew he wanted to do _something_. And he hated Alenko a little bit more because he suspected the marine not only could have told him what to do, but could have..._should_ have...been the one to do it...and Garrus wasn't the only one who knew it.

Alenko stopped again, turned just enough to look over his shoulder. "Just...be careful, Shepard. Cerberus...can't be trusted."

Garrus doubted Alenko heard the mangled snort that erupted from Shepard's lips like a particularly virulent curse. It was rather gratifying to hear such a compact sound in which his own complicated feelings were so perfectly expressed. After all, Alenko had just demonstrated that TIM wasn't the only person Shepard couldn't trust...and Alenko was the only one who didn't seem to realize it.

Garrus wasn't sure if that was a pity or, really, for the best.


	17. Unarmored

**Note: **All standard disclaimers still again to all the people who've taken time to encourage me by adding me or my story to favorites. And, most especially, thanks to those few who've written reviews. Your interest and support is always appreciated, and often instrumental to maintaining the inspiration necessary to develop a story.

**Chapter-Specific Notes**: Takes place following _Parts Answering Parts_: Chapter 11, _The Best Bridge_

* * *

Nightmares.

As little as Shepard enjoyed the images that troubled her, they had been the constant companions of her resting hours for so long she simply tended to regard the time as being_ for as long as she could remember_.

It wasn't true, of course. Not technically.

She certainly remembered a time before Akuze. But the memory seemed so distant as to be detached, almost unreal.

The feeling reminded her strongly of waking up in that Cerberus lab, feeling that her surroundings-not to mention the situation-were both typical and completely inexplicable. She wondered-and she worried-about whether or not the armor-familiar and unfamiliar at once-she'd donned would come to seem more natural to her than the armor it had replaced. Worse, she was certain she already knew the answer, and it wasn't one she liked. But...that was life. It was survival. It was one of the few certain things in a very uncertain existence. So...in a way, that damned armor was the most comforting thing she had.

Except, of course, when she wasn't wearing it.

And she wasn't wearing it now.

Which was actually a bit surprising as she couldn't quite remember how she had ended up in bed at all... let alone wearing the comfortable-but-unyielding skintight underweave to her armor and not one of the tank-and-boxer combos or oversized t-shirts she usually slept in.

That, coupled with the strange, pressing silence of her sleep, the absence of her nightmares, was unsettling in the extreme.

Her head felt full of cotton wool, dark, heavy, silent.

Her heart felt full of lead, sinking into her stomach, making it churn in a way she didn't quite understand.

She stumbled out of bed, lurching toward the console of her armor locker. As might be expected, the rest of her armor was there, stowed away with obvious care, not exactly in the way she usually stored it-her belt, for example, was resting, folded, on top of her chest plate instead of coiled up and set aside with her boots and gloves- but absolutely gleaming with care, as if it had just been polished.

She didn't remember taking her armor off. She didn't remember storing it. She didn't even remember cleaning it-a long and tedious job if any-but...it seemed as though she did remember something...something buried deep within the stifling weight suffusing her skull and her limbs.

A flash of something...light?

A strangled scream.

Muffled groaning.

The smell of blood, distinct and definite, but faint.

Maybe her sleep hadn't been nearly as untroubled as it seemed. A bit disturbing, that the thought should be so reassuring.

Something about the smell-beyond its mere existence-bothered her, though she couldn't quite identify the source of her concern.

As for the question of her nightmares, well...they usually jerked her upright, right out of a deep, sound sleep.

It seemed, somehow, deeply ominous that the images should be so...subtle. So elusive.

Like the difference between a highly-trained infiltration team and a full-frontal assault; the action on Virmire compared to the Battle of Torfan. It wasn't hard to say which was bloodier, really, most violent. On the other hand, in the long-term scheme of things, she had a feeling she knew which was more effective, even more devastating to the other side.

The other side.

She looked around, startled, suddenly reminded of the alien space of the room she occupied.

The large, luxuriously-appointed room.

Clean, open, elegant.

The cramped little bed, scarcely more than a cot, regarded as such an honor on any Alliance vessel, replaced by a huge double bed. Fluffy pillows littered the surface like rubble littered the floor of a building after an explosion, but the rumpled black and white linens still showed evidence of their previous crisp cleanliness, in spite of what seemed to be some faint splotches of almost-blue discoloration...

She shuddered in surprisingly violent reaction, though a split second's reflection was already telling her it was probably a trick of the light, defraction from the large, empty aquarium that had so unsettled her sleep ever since she'd boarded this ship.

This ship.

The _Normandy_.

But _not_ her _Normandy_.

This ship didn't belong to her. It didn't even belong to the Alliance. It belonged to Cerberus.

A Cerberus ship. She was on a Cerberus ship.

Shepard shuddered again, harder, and wrapped her arms around herself without thinking, shrugging up her shoulders as if doing so would dislodge the tension that seemed to have settled over them.

A glint of light from the direction of the desk caught her eye.

The picture.

If she stepped forward, it would flicker into life as if it had never been extinguished. Kaidan's frozen face. His dark and tender eyes. His taunt, sensual mouth, suggesting, only suggesting, his small, sweet smile.

She wanted to step forward. She wanted to turn away and pretend she had never seen it.

She wanted, more than anything, to know who had put it there...and why.

It could be, she wanted to believe it was intended to be, a kind gesture, meant to offer her some hope, some comfort, some consolation, a feeling of belonging in a strange place.

And it probably was.

Something Kelly might have done or, maybe even Miranda-odd as it was to think of the coolly-collected woman performing any action meant to impart a feeling of warmth-but whether the picture was intended as a kindness or not, Shepard couldn't help feeling unsettled at the sight of it, because when she saw Kaidan's face on her desk, all she could see was a sort of veiled threat, a reminder of how much Cerberus knew about her, about her past, about the people she cared for...people they could hurt if she didn't cooperate...and the Illusive Man may well have intended her to see just that.

Shepard huffed a sigh and reached up to rub the back of her neck. Her fingers came in contact with the warm, slightly rough surface of her undersuit, and memory seared through her like a shock of plasma.

People who could get hurt.

Turian flesh under her fingers, warm and rough.

People she cared for.

Her vision swam in and out of focus. The room swayed, looking black around the edges. She stumbled back and to the side until her back pressed against the wall. She slid along it until she managed to find the floor and sit on it, leaning forward just enough to rest her forehead on her knees. The sound of her own harsh breathing in her ears amplified, lilted, took on a strange harmonic resonance, became a short, choked gasp, repeated over and over like a prayer before dying.

_Garrus. _

She could see a single blue eye looking up at her, dilating until it held all of eternity.

She hadn't realized she'd spoken aloud, but EDI's voice was lapping at the edges of the swirling vortex that threatened to engulf her and drag out, out and back, back into the void...

"-rian,previously known to Cerebus only as Archangel, Operative Lawson has instructed me to inform you that-as of this time-he is still living."

Shepard released a lone, shivering sob. If she'd had the energy to care, she might have looked around sheepishly to see if EDI had noticed, but the AI continued to speak. Shepard let the words wash over her like the lapping waves of the Elysian Sea, until her body felt nearly boneless with relief.

"Although she did not mention it, her current vital signs would seem to indicate that Operative Lawson is nearing exhaustion. This is not surprising, as she has been on her feet since you departed the ship at 0600. I believe she may have observed that this is one of many reasons why it would have been wise to recruit Mordin Solus previous to any other potential operatives. As she did not enunciate clearly, however, I'm afraid I may have extrapolated her meaning incorrectly. She insists quite clearly, however, that she will remain as she is, in Medbay, until Dr. Chakwas has no further need for her services."

"Tell them I'm on my way to lend them a hand," Shepard said as crisply as she could manage, and hauled herself upright to yank on the zipper of her undersuit. The weave peeled away from her skin slowly, releasing a faint miasma of the same blood-smell she'd been vaguely aware of earlier. Now, more consciously, she realized the oddity she'd thought she'd detected was probably the smell of copper instead of iron.

Giving herself a firm injunction not to think about it, she put the undersuit in the laundry drawer of the armor locker, hauled out standard shipwear boots-and-utes and began applying them.

"I cannot," EDI said. Shepard blinked, wondering if she'd simply projected that faint suggestion of regret onto the AI's level voice.

"Something wrong with med-com?" Shepard asked rhetorically.

"All systems are functioning properly at this time," EDI said, sounding almost smug. "However, Operative Lawson-"

"Just who runs this ship?" Shepard snapped. "Me or Lawson?"

"You do. Illusive Man's orders, Commander Jane Shepard is named Acting Captain, Operative Miranda is named Acting XO by order of the Illusive Man."

Shepard made a garbled noise of frustration. If she hadn't been simultaneously terrified for Garrus and outraged with Miranda, she might have been amused.

"Look, Commander, no one wants you calling the shots more than I do," Joker's voice intervened, making her jump, bumping her shoulder into the bulkhead. _Some things_, some small part of her thought wryly, _never change_. And thank god for that. Some days, she'd take what she could get. This was definitely one of those times. _Hell, it's one of those __**lives**_, she thought, a little more consciously, and snorted around a wry grin. "But Operative Lawson-and her annoying little watchdog, here, too-are right about this one. You're no medic. Even if you were, doctors aren't supposed to operate on family. Your old squad...we were your family. We knew and we were damn proud of it."

"Dammit, Joker," Shepard hissed, taking a deep breath, sagging back against the bulkhead, one boot still clutched in her hand. "What did you have to go and say something like that for?"

"You mean something you can't argue with?" Joker's smug grin was apparent even through the audio feed.

"You know I do," she said and sighed.

"Just one of the many duties you keep me around to perform," he retorted. "You'd be lost without me, you know."

"Huh. I knew there was a reason I'd saved your ass," she said flippantly, then froze as the silence on the other side of the com channel changed. "Shit, Joker, I didn't mean-"

"Yeah, sure, Commander, I know."

Shepard shrugged her shoulders again and dropped her boot.

"And, uh, Commander?"

Shepard grunted shortly, both afraid of saying the wrong thing and preoccupied with the removal of her other boot.

"Thanks. For saving my ass."

Shepard snorted. "Makes us one-for-three doesn't it? I'd say I still owed you. Probably always will."

"And don't you forget it," Joker quipped, sounding more like his old self. "I might want to collect."

"Well," Shepard said, smiling in spite of the ache in her heart and the fear in her gut, "you know what they say."

"What would that be, Commander?"

"A man's gotta dream."


	18. A Ghost and a Lullaby

**Note: **All standard disclaimers still again to all the people who've taken time to encourage me by adding me or my story to favorites. And, most especially, thanks to those few who've written reviews. I welcome your interest, thoughts, and ideas-even constructive criticism. Your support is always appreciated, and often instrumental to maintaining the inspiration necessary to develop a story.

**Chapter-Specific Notes:** Much of the dialogue in this chapter is modeled around in-game dialogue. I always try to keep this sort of thing to minimum, but I'd like to think I've added to it for purposes of story**.** This chapter takes place following _Parts Answering Parts_, Chapter 13: _Along the Solitary Plain_. Another chapter installment of this scene is forthcoming. I broke it into halves so a) I could post, b) the installments would be of a size that was easier to read.

**Chapter Title Inspiration:** "If a man harbors any sort of fear, it percolates through all his thinking, damages his personality, makes him landlord to a **ghost**." Lloyd C. Douglas

* * *

The scent of burning flesh was sizzling in her nose, searing its way between her sinuses, making her eyes blur with tears. Shepard blinked impatiently, irritated with her own weakness, and saw, in that sliver of a second, a turian sprawled at her feet, still reaching for life with stiff, still hands.

She could hardly reach the main battery fast enough.

The doors seemed to take ages to hiss slowly open.

Garrus was hunched over the console, whole-well as whole as the last time she'd seen him, at least-and breathing, and _alive_.

Her heart pounded like a kettle drum. She clutched her fingers around her sweaty fists, as if trying to cling to something...something she couldn't quite name.

She thought maybe Garrus was too. There was something about his posture that was different...something sad. As if standing upright took all the will he could muster, leaving him barely enough to lift his hand.

"All right, Garrus?" It seemed to her she had never asked a question as complicated. Nor one with an answer she more wanted to hear.

But she had...she remembered.

She had asked him this same question once before, when she'd first caught sight of him in that abandoned building, under siege, but undefeated. Or, at least, she'd thought so then. Now...now, she wasn't so sure. And the realization terrified her almost as much as that damnned gunship.

Garrus steadied himself against the gunnery console, struggling to maintain his grip on the thin veneer of calm acceptance he'd managed to cobble together in the past few hours. "As well as can be expected," he assured her slowly. "The crew has been friendlier than I expected; being part of the team that took down Saren must have earned me some respect-"

just not from the one person whose respect he'd most wanted, the one person whose respect he had always been able to take for granted...until today.

He was being unfair. He _knew_ he was being unfair. He'd realized before he'd made it past the airlock. Sometimes, in spite of intelligence, in spite of training, in spite of knowledge, you couldn't control how you felt. You could only control how you acted...which she had been able to do...and he hadn't.

The thought filled him with shame, and the shame filled him with rage, though he could have scarcely have named a target. Except, perhaps, himself.

His whole damned culture was built on the idea of discipline, and he hadn't been able to practice it. He hadn't even been able to respect hers.

In fact, even now, he _still_ resented her calm, her control, her _orders_... and he could feel fear lurking, like a ghost, behind his shame, behind his bitterness.

Turning to face her was, quite possibly, the hardest thing he had ever done.

Shepard was waiting, just standing there, arms folded across her chest, her weight distributed on the balls of her feet, but tilted back, just slightly. She was looking him full in the face, and the look was...not soft...but...accepting. Steady. Open. Without censure.

Time fell away, and for just a moment, a single flutter of a single heartbeat, he was spirited back to a cramped little med clinic, a dead merc at his feet, and the whole universe unfurling wide with possibility so that the deck felt almost unsteady beneath his feet.

"We're all adults here," he said. It was as close to an apology as he could manage...and as close to forgiveness, too. He hoped she knew that. By the blasted spirits, he hoped she _understood _it. "We'll do what needs to be done."

"Of course," she said crisply, almost off-hand. A faint smirk hovered over the wide, slashing line of mouth. Her lips were soft and fleshy, strangely pliable and pink, but the line of them...that was nearly turian. Perhaps that was why her expressions always seemed so clear to him...like lines in a lullaby from childhood.

This...this was Shepard, beyond all rhyme, beyond all reason, beyond all doubt. He might not be able to recite the lyrics, but he could recognize the notes. And know with a knowledge humming in the very depths of his bones that she had never she had never doubted that. She had never doubted him.

"I was...I am..."

_an idiot._

"Just familiarizing myself with the new Normandy."

"A sound tactical maneuver," Shepard said, though with a bit more humor than Garrus would have expected the observation to warrant. "First move I made, too."

Garrus chuckled softly, anything but surprised.

Shepard shrugged slightly. She'd given up on surprising him long ago. "So...what do you think?"

He'd been trying not to, actually.

Trying not to think of her down there on that hellhole of a station, being shot at by a bunch of thugs who had no idea, no idea at all, of just what they were trying to destroy.

"Cerberus has spared no expense," he said, temporizing. "Maybe joining up with them is just what we need."

Shepard stiffened so quickly Garrus could hear her spine snap. "We are _not _ with Cerberus," she snarled. Garrus didn't think he'd ever heard her sound so angry. He wasn't sure he'd ever heard _any_ human sound so angry.

He splayed his hands out, rocking back on the heels of his feet in a turian gesture of sheepishness, submission. "Just a figure of speech, Shepard," he trilled as soothingly as he could manage. He'd never have expected she'd think otherwise, even for a second.

"Relax," he coaxed.

Some of the tension went out of her shoulders and she slumped against the console, her head hanging, heavy with dejection.

"Far be it for me to second guess your judgement," he said, speaking to the part of her posture he recognized, the part that reminded him of the embarrassed frustration he'd been feeling when she first arrived.

He'd always admired that about her, in fact. He'd thought she knew that. Her judgement had fascinated him, drawn him in, inspired him. Every word, every action, he knew she thought about them all, and that thought, that care, drew each element tight into a web in which cause and effect had surprising results.

More than anything, when she was gone, he had missed that, the effect of her judgement. The way it had given him something he had never had before he'd met her, something he couldn't hold onto after she was gone.

The ability to make a difference.

More than anything, he'd thought that if he could just do that, just make a difference...he'd be honoring her memory, ensuring that someone, somewhere, would think of them both with respect.

The respect she deserved...the respect he desperately wanted to be able earn.

Her judgement had condemned Saren to a coward's death at his own hand, and her judgement had saved the Citadel... but his judgement..."got my entire squad killed," he said, the words rattling through the room just the way they seemed to echo in the hollows of his heart.

He didn't want to talk anymore.

He hoped he was lying dead on the floor of that slum, right where he belonged. He didn't want to dream. He had no right to dream.

He wished she wasn't there.

He had no idea what to say.

"Tell me about them," Shepard said.

He didn't want to.

He was so ashamed.

He didn't want to think about them...

but somehow, the words were spilling out of him, and he was telling her everything.

He was confessing.

She listened without interrupting, without trying to soothe him with meaningless words, and he was grateful.

And, then, without warning, the words were gone.

"Look, Shepard, thanks for stopping by..."


	19. The Opposite of Two

: **I've recently (7-18-2011) posted a chronological ordering of the fragments in this fic. That posting is merely for convenience of reading. I will still be working haphazardly and posting to this fragment fic first and foremost...and that fic may occasionally be removed and reposted as chapter ordering changes. So, for those of you following this fic, please continue to do so. Thank you all so much! **

**Note: **All standard disclaimers still apply. Although I don't own the characters or universe, I do work hard on my little stories. Please don't print or repost without my knowledge. Thanks. And thanks again to all the people who've taken time to encourage me by adding me or my story to favorites. And, most especially, thanks to those few who've written reviews. I welcome your interest, thoughts, and ideas-even constructive criticism. Your support is always appreciated, and often instrumental to maintaining the inspiration necessary to develop a story.

**Chapter-Specific Notes:** Takes place immediately following _Parts Answering Parts _Chapter 18: _A Ghost and a Lullaby. _Some of the dialogue might be related to in-game dialogue, but I believe most of it to be the product of my own fevered little brain.

**Chapter Title Inspiration and Related Quotes:** What is the opposite of two? A lonely me, a lonely you. ~Richard Wilbur; Man, when he does not grieve, hardly exists. ~Antonio Porchia, _Voces_, 1943, translated from Spanish by W.S. Merwin; Sorrow you can hold, however desolating, if nobody speaks to you. If they speak, you break down. ~Bede Jarrett

* * *

The words were gone...

his squad was gone...

and Shepard remained, looking up at him with something...a look?...in her eyes that softened her entire face in a way he hadn't been expecting. The surprise of it hit him like charging krogan.

He leaned back against the console, hoping the sudden shaking in his knees and ankles wasn't obvious.

"I'll let you get back to work," Shepard said, without making a move toward the door. She didn't want to leave.

She'd been anxious about him before, anxious about him since she'd...since just before the first _Normandy_ had been lost.

And today, when she'd seen that damned plague...

It had been a savage satisfaction to put a bullet through the head of every vorcha in her line of sight. Even Miranda had seemed more-than-a-little impressed by her ruthless efficiency. But, satisfaction aside, she had barely been aware of who-or what-she shot. She was too preoccupied with the dead...and every corpse she saw wore Garrus Vakarian's face.

"I would like to get a better look at these guns," Garrus said awkwardly, clearing his throat.

"Of course," Shepard agreed as she took her first, reluctant, step. "Just..."

"Need something?" Garrus asked.

"The Professor should be joining us any time now," Shepard said.

"I figured as much," Garrus retorted, stepping forward and stretching out an arm as if to herd her toward the door. "Commander Shepard gets the job done."

"I want you to stop and see him as soon as he's been debriefed," she informed him.

"Is that really necessary?" Garrus asked a bit wearily. "I'm sure we'll have plenty of time to get acquainted while we're hunting down the...what was it again? The Collectors?"

The doors had begun to hiss open.

"Yes," she said, forcefully enough to draw him up short.

She stood just inside the open doors. Just within his reach. But she didn't move and she didn't look at him.

With every step she'd taken, all she had been able to think of was Garrus, Garrus by her side as they approached the quarantine zone...if the plague had managed to escape the barricade...Garrus dying...alone...again.

"You lost your squad...you need to grieve. I get it." She reached up and slapped one armored hand against her shoulder. "Oh, I get it. A hell of a lot better than I wish I did. I've lost people, too, Garrus. Jenkins...Ash...hell, I lost a whole damn _unit_ on Akuze-50 men, Garrus,_ 50_."

Shepard took a deep breath, rolled her shoulder, pressed her hand against it again, took another breath, shook it off.

Garrus felt like a heel...and he resented it. Just because Shepard had already had these feelings...was that supposed to make it easier for him to deal with? And then he felt ridiculously petty, because, she was sharing her experience, something he'd always welcomed...and how was she to know this time was any different? How was he? He didn't know why this time was different...he just felt that...it was.

It was different.

"Shepard-"

"I know-I _know_-it wasn't the same for you," she whispered, her voice tremulous. "I know this wasn't what _happened_, but when I came to in that damned medbay..._alone_...and the last thing I remembered was the end...the end of everything...it felt the same to me. It was like I'd lost you—all of you...and I just didn't know if I could go on...That kind of..."

_failure_, the word hovered there between them, unspoken, because to say would have felt like an accusation.

To think it was an accusation, too, but one they'd made against themselves and could never escape, an accusation they acknowledged to themselves, and—without words, without the need for words—to one another...

They had to acknowledge it in order to move on...but they didn't have to say it. They never had to say it. Some things should not be said...some things should not be made so...real, so final...

"thing...It can—"

Garrus laughed, the sound a bit desperate. "Yeah, I know."

_break you if you. If you let it._

She'd said the words aloud before, to Miranda, to Jacob...to whom she hadn't been ready to give any part of herself.

But to him, to Garrus, to whom she'd give anything—anything he asked—she couldn't say them, because...

Cerberus, even if only in the form of Jacob and Miranda—who both seemed likeable enough—deserved to bear the burden of what it had done in bringing her back, no matter what the reasons, but she didn't want Garrus to have to carry her pain.

She wanted him to let her help him carry his.

Her death had nearly broken him.

From what she'd just said, it had nearly broken _them._

But they were together and they were holding together...for now. Barely, maybe, but they were.

Slowly, hesitantly, Garrus reached out and put a hand on her back, the way he'd seen Alenko do from time-to-time. He thought it was a gesture of comfort.

Well, whether or not Shepard agreed, the contact was strangely comforting to him.

"Hells, Garrus, when I saw you step out in front of that gunship, I thought..." she swallowed, hard. She hadn't meant to dump this on him, hadn't meant to confess. "You were only touch-and-go for a couple of days, but...it felt like a couple of centuries. I don't think I'll ever be the same."

Shepard drew in a long, breath, turning it into an odd, snaky, shaky snicker. "It's a damn good thing you recovered, or I'd have had to kill you myself."

Garrus laughed. "And you wondered why I shot you."

Shepard's mouth twitched, "I assumed it was for cover."

Garrus snorted.

Shepard looked contrite. "I...I'm sorry Garrus, I never wanted to abandon you..." she turned slightly to the side, touching the armored fingers of her far hand to the armored fingers of his far hand.

"I know, Shepherd," he said, tightening both his hands, holding her just a bit tighter, reassuring...her, him, he scarcely knew. "I won't pretend I didn't miss you," he said slowly, searching for words. "I won't pretend your absence was anything other than a wound that wouldn't heal...but I always knew you'd be there if you could."

_And you were there, after a fashion. I could see you if I closed my eyes...hear your voice in my head..._

"And now here you are. I don't know _how _you're here-hell, I'm even a bit fuzzy on how _I'm _here-but the means matter less than the facts. You're here and you're alive. And so am I. The last thing I want is to waste the time we have crying over the time we've lost."

"Lost," Shepard repeated thoughtfully, tasting the word on her tongue. She sighed, her entire body catching, rising and dropping in his arms like the tide. "That's the word for it, all right. Lost. I-I've never felt more abandoned or alone or _lost_ in my entire life-_lives_-than when I woke up in the empty medbay of a base filled with security mechs programmed to kill any organic that moved-" she chuckled at the expression on Garrus' face "-without-without any of you."

"I'm here, Shepard," Garrus murmured uncomfortably, stroking his talons along the lines of armor banding the back of her waist. "I'm here, and I'm not going anywhere."

Shepard twisted slightly in his grasp, just enough to look up into his face. "Oh, yes, you damn well are."

Garrus felt his gizzard twist. He'd forgotten how damned good she was at producing that reaction. It was something he could have lived without remembering.

"You are going to see Doctor Solus," Shepard said firmly.

"Oh," Garrus grunted, relieved. "If that's all you want-"

Shepard tilted her head. The gesture was oddly turian. Garrus had the strangest impulse to lean down, just a little bit, and press the fanning plates of his forehead against the strange, broad, flat curve of hers. "No," she said seriously. "I wouldn't say that's all I want-"

Garrus groaned.

"But it will do to be getting along with," she told him, and smirked.


	20. Zombie

**_Very Special Note: _I've recently (7-18-2011) posted a chronological ordering of the fragments in this fic. That posting is merely for convenience of reading. I will still be working haphazardly and posting to this fragment fic first and foremost...and that fic may occasionally be removed and reposted as chapter ordering changes. So, for those of you following this fic, please continue to do so. Thank you all so much! **

**Note: **All standard disclaimers still apply. Although I don't own the characters or universe, I do work hard on my little stories. Please don't print or repost without my knowledge. Thanks. And thanks again to all the people who've taken time to encourage me by adding me or my story to favorites. And, most especially, thanks to those few who've written reviews. I welcome your interest, thoughts, and ideas-even constructive criticism. Your support is always appreciated, and often instrumental to maintaining the inspiration necessary to develop a story.

**Chapter-Specific Notes:** While this idea is mine, it is not uniquely mine. I know I've seen it in at least a fic or two before now. My kudos to the authors with a reminders that great minds think alike and imitation is the sincerest form of flattery. Also, this scene was intended to be longer when I started writing, but then I reached an end line that was too good to pass up. As far as placement goes, I haven't quite decided. It might be on the shuttle back from Horizon, which in case it would follow Chapter 16: _Now and Then_ but precede Chapters 2 and 3: _Half-Spoken Words_ and _The Continuous Thread_ OR (and I'm leaning toward this) it would come later, around the time a certain letter shows up in Shepard's inbox, which would place it after all the aforementioned chapters, previous to Chapter 7: _The Right Regrets_. If you have thoughts about this-or anything else-let me know.

* * *

"Kaidan thinks...I'm a zombie," she said, struck by the sudden urge to giggle.

"Zombie?" Garrus repeated, perplexed. The plates on his forehead spread out slightly, then pulled in tight until they overlapped. "Like in those movies Joker was always trying to get us to watch?"

"Not exactly," Shepard said slowly, "though that might actually make more sense. I mean, _those_ zombies were actually dead." _And so was I. _

"They were also mindless," Garrus objected, shifting slightly. His mandibles were fluttering in a way that made her think he was feeling agitated. She didn't feel exactly calm herself.

"Yeah, like husks...or thorian creepers. In fact, the creepers were why Joker wanted us to watch the movies, remember?"

"The sounds they made were very similar," Garrus allowed, "and so was the way they moved. Creepers, zombies, husks...not very coordinated. You on the other hand..." he paused, rocking his weight back and tilting his head to one side to assess her. "If anything, I think your sniping skills may have improved." He shook his head, mandibles flaring wide in a smirk of supreme satisfaction, and slapped his gloved hands against his armored thighs. "If anyone had asked me ahead of time, I'd have told them that wasn't possible-you were already the best."

Shepard smirked, too. "I make a career out of performing the impossible, you know."

Garrus groaned. "Don't remind me."

"Old military jargon," Shepard clarified. "A zombie is a dumb soldier, especially one conscripted into service."

"Dumb isn't the word I'd use to describe you, Shepard," Garrus said dryly. "Conscripted, on the other hand...sounds accurate enough for the current conditions."

"Dead on target," she said flatly.

"Doesn't really add up, though. If Alenko knew-"

"I'd say it was fairly obvious," Shepard sighed. "But, obvious aside, he doesn't."

Garrus blinked. "Uh, Shepard, aren't you the one who said..."

"He thinks I'm a zombie," Shepard repeated.

"Doesn't that seem..."

"A little contradictory?"

Garrus nodded.

"Have I ever mentioned...a common human aphorism for death is sleep?"

"Shepard, why the in names of all the spirits can't you just say what you mean?"

Shepard shrugged. "I could."

"But?"

"It would be boring...and you know why."

"Hearing isn't knowing?"

"Hit it in one. And who taught you that?"

"Fine." Garrus huffed. "Point taken. You win. Can we get back to this whole rigmarole about you being undead?"

"A zombie. Well...I guess I'm undead, too...but I'd rather not think about that, if you don't mind," she said primly. If they'd been talking about anything else, he might have found it funny. "We were discussing zombies...different kinds."

"I never would have signed on with you if I knew it would be like going back to school to study xenolinguistics."

"With a side of xenobiology-for balance," Shepard specified, quirking an eyebrow at him.

Garrus snorted. "Spirits preserve us. So...you're telling me a zombie is someone who was dead...and death is like sleep..." he murmured to himself, his eyelids drifting a bit. Arguing with Shepard was oddly comforting...relaxing, even...and it had been a damned hard, long day.

He jerked upright, thoughts of sleep vanquished. "You're telling me Alenko thinks you're a _sleeper _agent?"

Shepard nodded.

"He thinks..." Garrus trailed off, yanking at the cowl of his chestplate in... agitation...frustration...indignation... "you're a sleeper agent," he said again, giving up on his brief attempt to describe Alenko's thought process any more clearly than that.

Shepard rolled her shoulder, rubbing at the back of her neck as if erasing the last traces of the teasing teacher she'd just been. "That I faked my death and hid out for two years _because_ I _wanted_ to work Cerberus." She nodded again, grimly. "That's what I'm saying, yes. Exactly."

"You..."

_can't be serious._ The words formed in his mind, sure and immediate, but their meanings were so twisted, so complex and complicated, they tied his tongue in knots. The most central meaning, the one he wanted to hear, to think, to feel, to _believe_ was easy:

_would never do that. _ Circumstances might make her liar, but they would never make her dishonest. Whatever lies she might be forced to tell, Shepard would never walk away from her squad. Unless she was forced by circumstances...or...unless it was for their own good. And, considering what she knew about Cerberus, well, the only way she'd consider them good was...if the alternative was worse.

"_Or_," Shepard added, realization flaring in her eyes as if her own thoughts had been moving close in formation with his, "because I was working for Cerberus already."

_would never turn your back on the Council or the Alliance. _ Even if the Council was dead. Dead because they'd refused to listen to her. Dead because she'd listened to him. But dead. And the new Council was just like the Alliance. Hell, for all intents and purposes, it might as well _be_ the Alliance. And the Alliance had given her a nice pat on the head and shipped her into geth territory as quickly as they could.

Well, shit. Alenko's attitude was beginning to make sense. And that was the last thing Garrus wanted... because Alenko was wrong.

Garrus snarled.

"My thoughts exactly," Shepard said a bit weakly. She looked...well, Garrus hadn't seen a human look that way since the flu had hit the SR1.

Garrus reached out and cupped her head in his hand, forcing it down toward her knees. Shepard complied, yielding to the pressure of his touch without a fight, and sucked in a couple of deep breaths.

"You weren't," Garrus said sharply. It wasn't a question.

He'd seen her face...in those numerous labs. She'd been just as surprised as he had, taking potshots at those creepers and rachni.

He'd seen her face when they'd found Kohaku...

And her seen her face on Ontarom, waiting on the drop ship to pick her friend Toombs and that doctor he'd taken captive. She hadn't been with Cerberus then. He'd stake his life on it. By the blazing spirits, he already had...not that he would have had much of a life to stake if she hadn't come running to his rescue.

Shepard shook her head, her hair rubbing against his palm so that he could feel the silky glide of it through his glove. "Damn skippy...But," she added reluctantly, her voice a bit muffled, "I have to admit, the case is pretty freaking compelling."

"Circumstantial," Garrus muttered darkly, fighting the urge to growl again.

Shepard sucked in a couple more breaths. He moved his hand in instinctive response, stroking his fingers along the curve of her skull. She sighed. He thought there was something gratified about the sound, something content.

"Hey, Garrus, I was declared dead, right? Not missing-in-action?"

Garrus pulled his mandibles tight against his chin, thinking. It wasn't a time he liked to remember. "You were listed as missing-in-action..." he said slowly... "but...I think...your status was changed after a couple of days. Everyone assumed that even if you'd survived being spaced, you'd have run out of air or hit atmo by then..." he added apologetically.

"I did both in the first five minutes," Shepard said grimly.

Shepard gave a slight grunt that might have indicated discomfort, and shifted slightly next to him. "Hey, buddy, ease up there a bit," she said softly. Garrus glanced down in surprise and saw he'd tightened his talons into a fist without thinking, drawing strands of her hair taunt in the process. He pulled his hand away, embarrassed.

Shepard sat up. Overall, she looked liked her self again. Her face was a bit flushed, but with her pale human skin that wasn't too uncommon.

"There was a memorial service," Garrus said, folding his talons in his lap, resisting the urge to reach out and touch her...just to confirm...she was real. She was sitting there. With him.

"I...I'm not sure what to say," Shepard said. She gave an awkward cough.

"Good," Garrus said as sardonically as he could manage. "Then we don't have to talk about it."


	21. The Hand Dealt

**_Very Special Note: _I've recently (7-18-2011) posted a chronological ordering of the fragments in this fic. That posting is merely for convenience of reading. I will still be working haphazardly and posting to this fragment fic first and foremost...and that fic may occasionally be removed and reposted as chapter ordering changes. So, for those of you following this fic, please continue to do so. Thank you all so much!**

**Note: **All standard disclaimers still apply. Although I don't own the characters or universe, I do work hard on my little stories. Please don't print or repost without my knowledge. Thanks. And thanks again to all the people who've taken time to encourage me by adding me or my story to favorites. And, most especially, thanks to those few who've written reviews. I welcome your interest, thoughts, and ideas-even constructive criticism. Your support is always appreciated, and often instrumental to maintaining the inspiration necessary to develop a story.

**Chapter-Specific Notes:** With a nod in the general direction of _Dirty Harry_.

Chapter takes place immediately following Shepard's appointment to Spectre status, which would currently place it following Chapter One: _Enter Garrus_ and before Chapter 12: _Controlled Crashing_

* * *

Spectre.

She hadn't really meant for that to happen. At least...she didn't think she had.

She'd asked for it...and she'd sounded so sure, so certain in the process.

Shepard turned away from the dias, feeling almost dizzy, faintly nauseous, caught up in delirium.

The last time she'd really felt like herself had been Eden Prime...just before she'd looked over her shoulder and seen her handsome First Lieutenant stumbled toward the tall spire of the Prothean Beacon she'd been sent to retrieve... a beacon that had begun to glow rather ominously...

She remembered leaping forward before she'd really had time to stop and think, knocking the Lieutenant off his feet and out of harm's way...

She remembered a lot of stuff after that, too, but none of it felt quite...

right.

Depending on what had happened to her after the beacon had caught her up in a sudden, terrifying rush of energy like the screaming, pounding surf of a tidal wave...well...she might well be tossing about in med-bay, imagining all of this.

She rather hoped she was, really, when all was said and done.

Still, surreal as the last few days had seemed, something told her they were real.

Some parts were easier to believe than others.

The lieutenant, looking at her with warmth smoldering in the depths of his grave whiskey-colored eyes, for example...if anything, he seemed a little too good to be true.

The tall, tawny, towering woman on his right, well, she might just be the most believable thing in the room. The most relatable, without a doubt. She, like Shepard, was a fighter, a survivor, a skeptic.

The krogan and the quarian flanking her, on the other hand...well, they were equally unlikely. They looked as if they knew it, too. The krogan seemed to be deeply amused by the whole situation. The quarian just looked damned confused. Shepard knew how she felt.

"Feeling lucky, Shepard?" the turian on the lieutenant's left flared his mandibles. Now _he_ was vivid. Solid. Absolute. She wished she knew what it was about him that seemed so...

It might have been an optical illusion, but she thought she saw Williams' hand twitch in the corner of her vision. She subtly extended two fingers of her own hand, angling them out from her hip and dropping them sharply. Stand down.

"I don't know that luck has to do with it," Shepard said wryly. "Most days I think I'd have no luck at all-" _if it weren't for bad luck. _Most people might have thought surviving the slaughter of an entire unit, the opportunity to see a Prothean Beacon firsthand, running into-not one but three!-people who happened to possess leads on the very information she needed to catch a criminal, and becoming the first human ever to be named a Spectre, was good luck. Almost too good to be true, if anything.

Of course, those people had never had to live through-or up to...or _with_-any of those experiences.

She wondered sometimes, what it was she had been expecting when she signed with the Alliance military, planting her booted foot firmly in her parents' footprints. Whatever it had been, she was pretty sure she hadn't expected this.

Alenko frowned slightly, his puzzled brown eyes meeting her grey ones over the brilliant, blue-armored expanse of the turian's broad shoulder. Shepard shifted slightly, not quite a shake of her head, not quite a shrug.

"Why? You wanna make my day, Vakarian?"

"We should visit Flux." Garrus said with surprising enthusiasm, missing or ignoring the stifled snickers of the three humans.

"Flux?" Williams repeated, sounding wary. "Sounds familiar..."

"A club, right?" Alenko supplied thoughtfully. "The one that C-Sec officer mentioned?"

"You mean me?" the turian blinked, the plates on his forehead flaring and contracting.

"No, another one. Human." Williams said categorically, her face composed. Innocent.

"Seemed to be a fan of Shepard's," Alenko said. Did he sound a bit sullen, or was that Shepard's imagination? His eyes flicked away from hers, down toward the platform...but, then, the low, rumbling laugh of a krogan quaking through it was a little...distracting.

"Tall," Williams added. "Broad-shouldered. Blonde." She nodded to herself. "Cute." She raised her eyebrows in Shepard's direction. "I'm in. I may need to break out my tinfoil skirt for this one."

"Sounds like the kind of place I generally try to avoid," Alenko said. "Too many bright lights, too much noise...One giant headache. But this..." he tilted his head in Williams' direction as the corners of his mouth quirked. "Sounds like a sight I've got see."

Shepard definitely hadn't expected this. Not any of it. She hadn't asked for the hand she'd been dealt. But did that mean she wanted to trade it in for something different, easier in the end? That she wasn't willing to play?

Whatever happened, it ought to be interesting.

"Why not?" she said, laughing. "It's not like I had anything better planned." Hell, if anything, she was looking forward to it.


	22. Representative

**Note:** All standard disclaimers still apply. Although I don't own the characters or universe, I do work hard on my little stories. Please don't print or repost without my knowledge. Thanks. And thanks again to all the people who've taken time to encourage me by adding me or my story to favorites. And, most especially, thanks to those few who've written reviews. I welcome your interest, thoughts, and ideas-even constructive criticism. Your support is always appreciated, and often instrumental to maintaining the inspiration necessary to develop a story.

**Chapter-Specific Notes:** Chapter takes place immediately preceding Shepard's appointment to Spectre status, which would currently place it following Chapter One:_ Enter Garrus_ and before Chapter 21:_The Hand Dealt_.

* * *

A quarian, a turian in C-Sec armor, and a krogan- who seemed disreputable even by the standards for his species commonly held in polite society- stood in an awkward cluster between the door to his office and the news feed console, their backs all carefully aligned with the wall. It would have seemed like the punchline of a bad joke, if only the scene stopped there.

Much to Udina's undying mortification, it didn't.

There was Anderson, calmly standing at what had to be nearly the exact center of the room, regarding him as smugly as a volus in the act of closing a brand-new multi-billion-credit contract.

And the marine Shepard's team had managed to pull off Eden Prime-her name escaped him at the moment-one strand of dark hair pulling loose of her normally immaculate bun to fall across her sweat-smeared face, her pink-and-white armor spotted with blood, sitting off to the side, her booted feet crossed at the ankle... and propped up on his desk. She'd been eyeing the aliens almost resentfully, until Shepard informed Udina in no-uncertain-terms that they were there as her subordinates, at which point she'd begun to ignore them studiously instead.

And Alenko, the biotic, almost an after-thought in his unobjectionable dark armor, composed as a still-life on canvas, sitting beside _her_.

Shepard.

He'd known signing off on her inclusion as the Spectre candidate on board the _Normandy _had been a mistake.

Building up what little power and influence humanity had in the galactic community had been his life's work, and in a few days, this one grimy grunt had managed to destroy at least two of the best negotiating tokens he'd held in all those years.

But it was too damned late to do anything about that now. He just had to institute some damage control before things got out of control.

"An audience with the Council is serious business, Shepard," Udina snapped. "I don't appreciate your attempts to turn it into a circus."

Shepard shrugged. "Without us, you wouldn't even have a reasonable request for an audience, so you wouldn't be unreasonable enough to request an audience without us, I'm sure." She leaned back on the balls of her feet, crossed her arms over her chest, and looked the Ambassador directly in the eye.

He looked as if he had bitten into something extremely sour and was looking to spit it out without drawing too much attention to himself. "Well, you should be represented, certainly, I never meant to imply-"

"We wouldn't have any evidence to present at all without Garrus, Wrex, and Tali," Shepard repeated firmly, without the faintest hint of persuasion. "As individuals, they have already contributed significant support to our investigation...and their representation of their species may be absolutely invaluable."

Udina's eyebrows went up. He shot a distinctly skeptical look at the disreputable-looking trio.

"What better way to convince the Council of humanity's readiness to take a more central role in leading our fellow races than by demonstrating-visually, no less-that we're already working together in full cooperation?" Shepard asked coolly.

Udina flinched as if she'd waved a fist in his face and threatened to slug him.

Anderson smirked.

Kaidan caught Anderson's eye and hastily looked away before the grin had time to spread to the surface. When was the last time he'd been this tempted to laugh-on duty or off? He couldn't seem to remember. The air of ...well... not humor exactly, but... unexpectedness, maybe... that seemed to shimmer around Shepard warmed his blood in an unsettling-but not-necessarily-unwelcome- though he supposed it should be, really- sort of way.

"No presentation without representation," Shepard murmured archly. Was it Kaidan's imagination or had she cast a look toward him and Anderson beneath her lashes? As if to say she knew what they were thinking, and she enjoyed the joke as much as they did. But... whether she had or not, there was not hint of amusement in her tone as she continued, "Either we all go, or none of us do."

_Including you. _The unspoken corollary was clear as crystal, ringing through the room. If Udina wouldn't give her what she wanted, she wasn't about to give him the evidence. Even if meant the Council continued doubting her version of the events that had led to the death of their Spectre.

The woman had a spine that rivaled the interior support beams of the god-damned Citadel. It was enough to make a man's temperature spike, it really was. His temperature or his blood pressure.

Udina paused, narrowing his eyes at Shepard.

Shepard stood and tossed a look into the corner. "Ready?"

Kaidan swallowed hard and hoped nobody noticed. Williams raised her eyebrows at him and smirked. He resisted the urge to squirm.

"Willing and eager," the turian C-Sec officer chimed in, apparently without subtext, although Kaidan could almost see him resisting the urge to rub his hands together. It was just as well...if there had been subtext, well... Udina's head might have exploded. _Or I might have experienced a sudden, unfortunate discharge of biotic energy that pounded the insubordination right out of the little maverick_, Kaidan thought, appalled by the intense surge of satisfaction that accompanied the mental image. But not quite appalled enough to stifle the almost simultaneous reflection- _Williams would help me do it, too, I know she would. _


	23. Just What to Say

**Note:** All standard disclaimers still apply. Although I don't own the characters or universe, I do work hard on my little stories. Please don't print or repost without my knowledge. Thanks. And thanks again to all the people who've taken time to encourage me by adding me or my story to favorites or alerts. And, most especially, thanks to those few who've written reviews. I welcome your interest, thoughts, and ideas-even constructive criticism. Your support is always appreciated, and often instrumental to maintaining the inspiration necessary to develop a story.

**Chapter-Specific Notes: **Heavy on the swearing. Considerably more xeno than any thing you've seen from me, and slightly graphic, but I don't think it's enough to surpass a T-rating. This scene definitely occurs after Horizon, how much after is up for debate. I also have a couple other similar scenes in mind (though with no ETA in sight), so I may end up having to pick and choose if they get too repetitive. I haven't quite decided if this is before or after Shepard and Garrus have discussed their tension, though it seems kind of obvious from the high level of hormones and sappy-sweetness that they probably have. For the time being, it's probably safe to say this chapter follows all of the other chapters currently in existence.

* * *

"I've just figured out something," Shepard said.

"Oh?" Garrus said politely, but without pausing in the adjustments he was making to the assault rifle he held in his lap.

Shepard was too distracted to notice his distraction. "Something's been bugging me since Horizon," she continued almost wistfully, looking rather like she had that time she'd accidentally been caught up in Wrex's biotic charge across the battlefield

Garrus' hands twitched. He pulled them hastily away from the assault rifle, but he didn't think firearms safety was the reason he could feel his heart tied up and beating in his gullet.

"One of us should have punched Kaidan?" he suggested, striving to sound off-hand. Weirdly enough, he'd been willing, even eager to discuss that meeting at the time. In fact, he'd wanted-needed-to express his outrage, his disgust, his indignation, and his... support... so badly that it had been hard to delay speaking until they didn't have an audience. But... having gotten that off his chest, so to speak, he found he wasn't anxious to revisit the subject.

He'd thought it was done and debriefed. Over. And he'd liked it that way.

"Nah. I knew that at the time," Shepard returned flippantly. "But it wouldn't have done any good," she added ruefully, shaking her head. "Some people are too thick to beat sense into... although... you do have one hell of a right hook." She smirked at him, her eyes sparking with mischief and something much... warmer.

The knot in his gizzard began dissolving into a flutter quite a bit lower. But he had to be imagining that. He was just so damned nervous.

"Sure you don't want me to hunt him down?" He meant the words to be teasing, but part of him wanted to do it, and not just to make her feel better.

Shepard snorted. "Not that I don't appreciate the offer, but we sort of have a galaxy to save here, Garrus."

Garrus groaned. "Don't remind me."

"Oh. Right." Shepard said grimly. "Like I was saying... I had a nagging feeling that there was something about that mission on Horizon something I'd missed or forgotten... but I've suddenly realized... it wasn't that. The collectors _reminded_ me...""

Either _Normandy_ was experiencing some sort of troubling air circulation problem or the sudden loss of Shepard's playful humor made the room feel ten degrees colder. Garrus felt all the plates on his body tighten. "Of rachni?" he asked, struggling for flippancy.

Shepard gave him a very odd look.

"What? You can't tell me the Collectors don't look like bugs to you."

Shepard coughed. "Well, okay, maybe a little... but... no, that wasn't... Saren," she said suddenly and loudly.

Garrus felt his mandibles flutter in an expression of surprise very much in keeping with that strange gesture humans called blinking. "Well..." he drawled, "Saren was definitely too... what was the expression?... _too thick to have sense beaten into him_, if that's what you mean."

Shepard laughed and nudged him just above his waist with her elbow. Garrus was wearing armor, but it didn't seem to prevent her touch from vibrating through his plates like a shockwave. He managed not to twitch in reaction, but he couldn't quite prevent himself from leaning toward her like a large tropical flower, listing toward the warmth of the sun.

"I don't know," she teased, "he saw reason in the end."

"And denied us the satisfaction of shooting him."

"True. Selfish to the end-"

"Like-"

"Like I was saying," Shepard said, spearing him with a look that was considerably less displeased than he'd expected... a look, in fact, that seemed almost amused, "the end wasn't the end. Remember Garrus? Saren shot himself and then..."

"He was dead," Garrus said flatly, but not without humor. It was an friendly argument they'd had over many drinks in many bars in the weeks following the battle. Just like old times.

"And then he was shooting at us." Shepard repeated her usual line. "And behaving in a decidedly odd manner to boot. For one thing, he had that weird blue glow... for another, he kept hopping around like a geth ghost. Damn those things were annoying."

"So was Saren."

"Singing to the choir, Vakarin. But that wasn't Saren. It was Sovereign."

"Yeah, yeah. Sovereign had been controlling Saren for a long time at the point, best we can figure, so it's really all just-"

"Xeno-lingustics?" Shepard suggested, raising an eyebrow.

"Well, yeah. Basically. Semantics."

"Maybe," Shepard allowed. "But, Garrus, think about it... that voice on Horizon. The one that kept shouting bizarre things at us the whole time."

"Us? Pretty sure it was talking to you, Shepard," Garrus retorted, then wished he hadn't. He didn't like to think of her being in the line of fire without him. She could take care of herself... and him into the bargain. She always could. But... she shouldn't have to. She'd earned some rest and relaxation.

"Maybe. But it was shooting at us. Remember?"

Garrus stared at her, but before he could even begin to think she wasn't making much sense to him, the comparison clicked into clarity like a well-timed sniper shot. "Assuming direct control... The ship. That ship... you think it's a reaper?"

"Well, yeah..." Shepard looked mildly startled at the idea. "I mean... probably?"

Garrus lowered his head and gave her a look from under his crest plates.

She gave him a brief, sharp chuckle and a shrug in response. "I was more interested in the _direct control_ itself... Garrus... when I... while I was gone..." she took snorted, took a deep breath, squared her shoulders and said flatly, "when I died."

Garrus emitted an involuntary squawk of protest, his assault rifle clattering to the floor and bouncing off his feet. "Spirits, Shepard, I thought we decided we didn't need to talk about that?"

Shepard stood, bent, retrieved his forgotten rifle and put it gingerly on the table. Eventually, she faced him squarely and continued, "Cerberus only managed to resurrect me-" she stopped with a breathless laugh and rubbed at her shoulder and the back of her neck. " Jesus, messiah complex anyone?- I mean... Cerberus had to use a lot of cybernetics and biosynthetics to... _bring me back_."

"Listen, Shepard..." Garrus reached out and caught her hand- cool and soft and light- where it rested on his assault rifle, his three talons easily enveloping her narrow palm. "Does it matter? They did what they had to do... And I- for one- am damn grateful for it." He stared at their joined hands as he spoke. The contrast was... striking. He knew humans were red-blooded, but her veins traced lines beneath her flesh, lines just as blue and bold as his markings. Fascinated, Garrus reached out and traced one lightly, delicately, with the very tip of a talon, careful not to pierce the tender flesh.

Shepard drew air in through her teeth, a faint but definite sound, sharp as a hiss. Garrus froze, turning his eyes to her face, afraid of what he would see... anger, fear, disgust... but her eyes were lowered, hidden by the thick dark fringe that framed them, but seemingly fixed on their joined hands, her lips parted, her cheeks flushed... she looked just as soft as her skin and strangely appealing.

They stood like that for a long time... and for hardly any time at all.

"They got the job done," Shepard breathed at last. "And... you heard what I told Liara, didn't you? If it gives me the chance to finish what I started, I don't regret it. Not now. Not ever. Hell, Garrus, just this... time with you is... more than I could have asked."

Garrus was beginning to feel that fluttering again, and no wonder.

They had to be crazy, speaking to one another like this... okay, they'd never been a typical commander and her subordinate... but even as friends, this conversation, well, it was... awkward, confusing, odd... and one of the happiest moments in his life.

He could think of three times he had been happier... and there was Shepard, standing at the center of all three. Big surprise. He supposed that even if that didn't worry him, the thought of her realizing it should, but it didn't. He was pretty sure she knew. For that matter, maybe it was just his vanity, but he kind of suspected he might be standing at the middle of most her happiest memories, too.

But thinking about _that _just made the fluttering that much worse.

"Then..."

"Cybernetics," Shepard repeated and shivered. "Remind you of anyone?"

"Ummm... every biotic living?"

Shepard laughed, but the sound was cold and bitter. Now that, that reminded him of Horizon, or right after. "Biosynthetic fusion."

"Shit. Saren-"

"Was ranting about all that stuff just before he went all blue and batty." Shepard agreed.

"Shepard... you don't honestly think... Cerberus rigged you up so you could be overtaken as the indoctrinated servant of a Reaper... do you?"

"Whether or not Cerberus meant to make it possible..." Shepard murmured, "I'm still on the fence over that one."

"What fence?"

"Oh, right. Xeno-linguistics. I mean, I don't know if Cerberus had any idea they were making me more vulnerable to indoctrination. Assuming they didn't spend trillions of credits to bring me back just to kill me or destroy humanity- which would sort of be the opposite of their mission statement- probably not."

"Well, there you go. And given how obsessed that voice seemed to be, if whatever it was could have _assumed control_, it would have. So-" Garrus could hear the shrill edge to his voice and hoped like hell she couldn't.

"I'd love to believe that, Garrus," Shepard said dully, "but indoctrination happens cumulatively over time, remember? Just because it didn't reach critical mass the first time doesn't meant it won't the next time, or the time after that."

"Well, the only way we'll know about that is if it happens, right? And if it happens, we'll deal with it then, Shepard. Remember what you told me about Saren? When I asked you what you would do if you caught and the Council tried to run interference?"

Shepard nodded. "I told you I'd decide what to do when it happened. It's-"

"-a mistake to make a plan of action without all the available information." Garrus finished firmly.

"I'm not asking you to make any decisions, Garrus," Shepard murmured gently, sounding almost apologetic. "But... _if_ it happens... I need to know... promise me you'll take me down."

"Shepard..."

"One shot, one kill."

"I'm not the only sniper on this ship, Shepard! Why not ask the assassin? Or the mercenary? Hell, I'm sure the convict would be more than happy to pull you into pieces. Some days, I bet Miranda would fight her for the privilege! So would Mordin if you keep bringing up the genophage!"

Shepard laughed, her free hand coming up to push his shoulder. "Asking Jack to kill me is probably the most fail-proof route to ensure she doesn't, you know."

Garrus snorted. He'd learned that from the best. He was just starting to take a surreptuous breath of relief when Shepard added, "But most of the rest might be reliable enough."

"Well, there you go," Garrus said when he'd stopped sputtering. "One squad meeting away from assisted suicide, how nice."

"First of all, making this little... _complication_... common knowledge could seriously impair morale. Not exactly a sound tactical procedure, particularly when approaching a _suicide _mission."

"Yeah, okay, so maybe considering something that could get you killed isn't the same as wanting to get killed-"

"Exactly," Shepard said adamantly. "And thank you, very much for noticing. I'm not exactly anxious to get myself killed- again-"

"Could have fooled me." The anger in the words made her raise her eyebrows. He raised his free hand in some slight movement toward a turian shrug, then, as if to say he'd changed his mind, and wasn't about to apologize, reached up touched her hand on his shoulder instead.

"Secondly, you have a point about Thane. I will ask him."

"Well, if you have him, I guess you won't be needing me," Garrus said, sharply. He pulled his hands away from hers and reached for the assault rifle.

Shepard seized the rifle- not exactly the most amazing feat she'd ever performed as she'd already been touching it- and held it up behind her head.

"Thirdly- even though I will ask Thane, he doesn't accompany me that often. There's a good chance he'll be shipside when the shit hits the fan. I need _you_, Garrus. I _trust _you. You're the one I want on my six. Now. Tomorrow. Next week. Next year. Always. For the rest of my life."

He couldn't help it, not quite. He'd been around human marines too damn long... or maybe the culprit was Wrex? Either way, even as he took one long stride into her personal space, his hand extended to snatch his gun out of her hand, his eyes went for her six like they'd been given an engraved invite.

Turian women were like their men- sharp angles, crisp and precise. Delineated.

A lot of females, human and asari, even- no, especially, quarian- had pronounced curves at their hips that left him feeling a bit dizzy and disoriented.

Shepard... Shepard was no turian, but her curves were smooth and gradual. Subtle. Understated. Simple, spare. Elegant.

Dear spirits, her ass looked like the rise of a planet limned against space... which was actually one of the most inexplicably breath-taking sights Garrus could imagine... in spite of the number of times he had seen it.

Garrus sighed. "Shepard..."

"Garrus, if that Reaper or Collector or whatever the hell it is, if it _assumes control_ of me and sabotages our squad and our mission, it's not just the squad... or you... or me... that's at stake there. It's everyone. Everywhere. Life as we know it. Even if I could ever be myself again, which is doubtful... I wouldn't want to live with that."

His talons gripped the assault rifle, framing her face, neck and shoulders directly between his forearms, he relaxed his grip, letting her take the rifle... she lowered her arms and he thought he heard it clatter on the table, but he didn't much care. He lowered his talons to cup her shoulders, sliding them along the length of her arms as to reassure himself she was still there- and still whole. "Neither would I."

"Then we have to succeed." Shepard fingers whispered over his fringe and settled at the back of his neck.

"Looks that way."

"Whatever it takes?"

Garrus sighed again, but he nodded. "Whatever the cost. And if you end up being part of the price we pay... there will be no one in the galaxy who can put a stop to my vengeance." _And only my vengeance will stand between me and my death._

Shepard smirked. "Ah, Vakarian, you always know just what to say to a girl."


	24. Doubts

**Note:** Can you wait for ME3? I can't! I'm going crazy! Needless to say that updates will continue to be slow, but that enthusiasm and inspiration will be high. I hope my readers will stick with me for the ride.

All standard disclaimers still apply. Although I don't own the characters or universe, I do work hard on my little stories. Please don't print or repost without my knowledge. Thanks. And thanks again to all the people who've taken time to encourage me by adding me or my story to favorites or alerts. And, most especially, thanks to those few who've written reviews. I welcome your interest, thoughts, and ideas-even constructive criticism. Your support is always appreciated, and often instrumental to maintaining the inspiration necessary to develop a story.

**Chapter-Specific Notes:** I currently have this in mind as taking place near the end of LotSB. I don't think there are many specific spoilers, but there might be a few contextual hints. I envision this as taking place after _Parts Answering Parts_ 23: Just What to Say, but needless to say the two are sort of a good pairing in terms of timing and content. I intended to expand on this a bit more, but as always, when I can't pass up a great end line. I think the rest will go better into another chapter anyway, when I get to it.

* * *

When Shepard had offered him a tie-breaker, Garrus was startled.

He knew Shepard was female in a sort of theoretical way, the way he understood how to breathe, or what kept his blood pumping. It was a natural, inevitable fact of the world he lived in, something he accepted without conscious thought or consideration, with no reflection about how his life might be if it were otherwise.

It was what it was.

Shepard was what she was, and that was as it should be, without question.

He was what he was, too. He might be male, but he certainly wasn't human.

Oddly enough, it was exactly because her offer was direct that her tone hadn't immediately struck him as odd, cluing him in. Shepard didn't sound like a woman on the prowl to him, she didn't even particularly sound like a woman, she just sounded like herself.

Shepard.

On reflection, though, the tone she had used with him wasn't the one he remembered her using with Kaidan... it was close, but... it had been different when she'd spoken to Kaidan, somehow. More subtle, he thought. Less confident. Less direct. Which was part of what had made it stand out so clearly to him at the time, new to human culture as he was, perhaps. Shepard was, as a general rule, direct. It made her far easier to relate to than some other humans-Kaidan, for one.

Which made him realize that while it was true that the particularly feminine tone he equated with her interest in Kaidan had never been present when she spoke to him-and wasn't in fact entirely present even when she'd attempted to proposition him-maybe interest of a more-than-platonic sort hadn't been quite as entirely absent from their conversations... it had just been different. At once less obvious and less... diffident.

It simply was what it was and there was no need to apologize for it. Like her. Like him. Like the two of them. Together.

On some level he'd been aware of that for quite some time. Not only aware, but appreciative. Flattered. Maybe even...relieved?

He'd never allowed himself to recognize it before, but it was obvious in retrospect. He watched her with an interest that went far beyond that a soldier held for his commanding officer, further than the fascination of a protege for his most admired mentor. She interested him in so many more ways and on so many more levels than just that of a companion in arms.

In fact, as he'd become increasingly aware since her return from death, he was having a harder and harder time regarding her as anything but a companion he'd like to have in his arms...

An impulse that had spoken for itself-and for him-almost as soon as he'd understood Shepard's little proposal...long before he'd processed the fact that it was really happening, let alone the implications.

Garrus still wasn't entirely clear on either of those points, but...

since that proposal and his impulsive response, he'd found himself noticing a thousand small things, little beauties that drew him in and held him captive...

And as confused as he found himself, he was twice as grateful. He could scarcely believe his luck...and, for once, it wasn't because it had just gone bad. Well...

yet, at least.

There was always time.

Time... and that look. That look, there, in Liara's eyes.

That look reminded him of the way he'd felt when Shepard first stepped out onto that bridge and back into his sights. It was like... being reborn. Like coming back from the dead.

And if Liara felt like he did... well... Garrus couldn't help but wonder just how similar their feelings really were.

Now that he'd begun to think that maybe Shepard's tenderness hadn't been as staunchly reserved for Kaidan as he'd believed, Garrus found himself reminded that some people had had their doubts on that score long before he had...

Speculation among the crew had run rampant at the time. So rampant, in fact, that Kaidan had seemed to be more than a little discomfited by the rumors. Which Garrus had thought ridiculous-part and parcel of the man's exasperating ambivalence where his own feelings for Shepard were concerned.

Now, having belatedly fathomed the depths of the attraction Shepard held for him as well as-he hoped- having caught a slight glimpse of her similar interest in him, Garrus was forced to concede that perhaps Alenko had seen a lot more than Garrus had realized at the time.

Unfortunately, he also had to admit that those doubts were not-and never had been-directed toward Shepard's friendship with _him_.

It was starting to seem as though maybe he'd misunderstood just how similar humans and turians could be, in the end... Being familiar, perhaps the idea of indulging in a bit of the same sort of casual impulse so common among his people ought to have been a relief. Maybe he should even have found it encouraging. It worried him that he didn't. Not in the least. If anything, he found it...disappointing.

That surprised him.

Though perhaps it shouldn't.

If her death and his ill-fated last stand had taught him anything at all about anything, it had certainly taught him that life without Shepard wasn't worth living.

But life with Shepard...

was damned confusing, nothing but varying shades of gray. And, as he'd told her himself, he didn't have the first idea how to handle gray. He didn't have the first idea how to handle her. The longer he was with her, the worse it got.

The look in Liara's eyes, still clinging so desperately to the smooth curves of Shepard's face, the quaver in her voice, broke his heart, because he knew exactly how she felt. He couldn't help suspecting-all evidence to the contrary-that Kaidan Alenko did as well.

And it broke his heart all over again to know that, of them all, he had the least right to lay claim to Shepard's heart.

He might have considered himself well matched against Alenko...It was true that the man already had her love, but it was just as true that he'd relinquished all prior claim to that love as if he'd held its value to be nothing, just as surely as he'd proven the value of his loyalty and his trust to be null and void.

Garrus, on the other hand, would kill or die before he'd walk away from her, and Shepard knew it. There was no one she trusted to be her friend and partner the way she trusted him. She'd told him so herself, multiple times. And he felt the same about her. Wasn't that exactly what he'd incoherently confessed in the split second it had taken him to agree to her suggestion? His heart knew what his head hadn't processed... it knew what mattered most.

But...

Liara had done what Alenko hadn't. What Garrus hadn't. She hadn't abandoned Shepard for a moment, not even when she was dead and gone. Liara, and Liara alone, had put her own life and, what was-for her and for Garrus alike-even more tellingly valuable, Shepard's affection, on the line and she'd done the impossible.

She'd brought Shepard back.

If that wasn't love, Garrus didn't know what would ever deserve the name.


	25. From Doubt to Certainty

**Note:** Can you wait for ME3? I can't! I'm going crazy!I'm keeping away from spoilers and keeping my fingers crossed for lots of gooey Garrus goodness! Needless to say updates will continue to be slow, but that enthusiasm and inspiration will be high. I hope my readers will stick with me for the ride.

All standard disclaimers still apply. Although I don't own the characters or universe, I do work hard on my little stories. Please don't print or repost without my knowledge. Thanks. And thanks again to all the people who've taken time to encourage me by adding me or my story to favorites or alerts. And, most especially, thanks to those few who've written reviews. I welcome your interest, thoughts, and ideas-even constructive criticism. Your support is always appreciated, and often instrumental to maintaining the inspiration necessary to develop a story.

**Chapter-Specific Notes:** Contains about 3 lines of dialogue directly from the game. Takes place after _Parts Answering Parts_ 24: Doubts.

**Chapter Title Quotes:** "Jealousy lives upon doubts. It becomes madness or ceases entirely as soon as we pass from doubt to certainty." -Francoise de le Rouchefoucauld

"Instead of playing to win, I was only playing not to lose..." -Sean Covey

""For God's sake, let's take the word 'possess' and put a brick round its neck and drown it ... We can't possess one another. We can only give and hazard all we have."- Dorothy Sayers

* * *

"Closer to home?" Shepard sounded startled, nearly as startled as Garrus had felt when she'd first flippantly offered him a skip to the tie-breaker. "Garrus...I don't want closer to home, I want someone I can trust." _I want you. _It amazed her that Garrus, so much more skilled at hearing and translating human subtext-her subtext-than anyone-human, quarian, krogan, asari, or otherwise-she'd ever met couldn't hear that, but...

It scared her a little bit to think that maybe he could.

Maybe he just didn't like what he heard.

Garrus tipped his head, pulling at the armor plating around his cowl as if trying to loosen up some breathing space or ease a crick in his neck like one she was constantly rubbing at in hers. Maybe a bit of both. "It's just...well...I was recently reminded...you have more than one friend you can trust."

Shepard stared at him blankly for a few seconds, then snorted. "Well, this can't be about Alenko and Tali's been on board since before-wait-Liara?"

Garrus looked down at his console at an angle that granted him a full view of her face. He couldn't bring himself to look her in the eye, but he couldn't deny the need to see her emotions play across that smooth canvas as surely and as clearly as he could hear them playing through the thin silver thread of her voice. At some point, long, long, so long-a lifetime-ago, he'd grown attached to reading those complex variations -just like the constant live feed of information that scrolled through his visor. He rarely took it off anymore. He scarcely knew how to function without it.

Shepard sighed, shaking her head and reaching up to rub the back of her neck, out along the line of her shoulder, rolling it under her hand as if testing the movement, feeling it out, letting her thoughts follow the motion like a guide. "What the hell is it with asari?" she murmured to herself, shaking her head again in response to her own question. "The whole damn galaxy is so in thrall to them it expects everyone else to be, too, and damn well won't take no for an answer."

Garrus coughed, caught himself shuffling his feet, and stopped. "Excuse me?"

Shepard snorted again. "You heard me. I am not, nor have I ever been, nor do I ever expect to be in love with Liara T'Soni. Even if it appears she and I are the only two people who will ever believe that."

"That's just it, Shepard. You two seem to have...an _understanding_." Garrus huffed a turian sigh.

Shepard paused, hand on her shoulder. "We do," she said simply.

Garrus nearly snarled with a rage that left him feeling...hollow. And more than a bit unnerved.

"Garrus..." Shepard's brows drew together slightly, then separated as the clouds gathering in her eyes cleared. They narrowed, almost imperceptibly, sharpening the way they did when she was lining a shot up in her sights. "Are you jealous?"

"Jealous?" Garrus repeated, feeling both genuinely confused and a bit guilty. "I...that is...I mean...that's not the point. It's not about that, Shepard."

"I see," Shepard said neutrally. Garrus had the strangest impression she was disappointed, though he couldn't have put a talon to the reason why. "Then what is it about, exactly?"

"All I'm trying to say, Shepard," he said, pleased that so little of his inner turmoil bled into his voice she probably couldn't hear a hint; human ears weren't tuned to nuances to the extent that turians understood them. "Is that you should be with someone who can make you..._comfortable_."

"Ah, but in that case, Garrus, I'm afraid you're still on the hook," Shepard said, sounding wry.

"Because no one, absolutely no one, makes me feel more at ease than you-you're my port in every storm-or hadn't you noticed? You don't honestly think I'd tell anyone who asked my doubts and fears, do you?"

"Just anyone?" Garrus repeated, surprised. "No, definitely not. I know you haven't told any of the new squad or crew. But Chakwas, or Joker, or Tali...or Liara? Yeah, I think you'd tell them. Especially her."

Shepard shrugged slightly. "I did tell her more than I would have told anyone else-"

Light gleamed in her eyes like sun breaking through storm-clouds, a brilliance so bright he could feel its warmth on his plates.

Which only made lump of grief lodged in his throat seem that much colder and more bitter by comparison. Garrus gulped, trying to force it down to free the words he knew he had to say, however little he could stand to say them.

"Of course," Garrus said, still struggling for calm, "I understand, Shepard, it's only natur-"

"Except you, Garrus." Shepard said a bit sharply, but with the same warmth in her voice that gleamed in her eyes. The abrupt tone was more like a love-tap than a cut or even a slap. It was, in fact, damned inviting...or it would have been if only he'd felt like it was more personally directed at him...he hadn't realized before just how much he'd grown to expect and rely on it being something...exclusive. Intimate. He hated doubting that, and he hated himself for needing to believe it.

"And I told Liara because she asked," Shepard continued. "I tell you because... I can't help myself. Somehow, when I'm around you, I just can't imagine holding anything-any part of myself-back. I thought..." _ you knew that...that you felt the same..._

"Liara and I... it just isn't like that, Garrus," she said firmly, looking him straight in the eye, unwavering. For a long moment, she didn't do or say anything else, but simply stood there, taking him in. Then, just when Garrus thought he might spontaneously explode, she gave a slight, breathy chuckle, lifting her shoulder and dropping it ever-so-slightly in the ghost of a shrug. "Well...maybe it isn't _unlike _that, either. At least...not _entirely_." That gleam in her eyes and the quirk at the corners of her lips appeared to have intensified.

Garrus hadn't realized his mandibles could twitch quite that rapidly. Nor that the asynchronicity between them and the faint flicker that seemed to have developed in the plates on his forehead would be so maddening. It was going to drive him insane, if it wasn't simply a testament to the fact he was there already.

"Liara understands me better than anyone else in this universe could ever hope to," Shepard elaborated, and the red haze tinging the edges of his vision thickened exponentially. It had the oddest effect, making Shepard look strangely as if she were smirking. "Linking minds...sharing memories...it _is_ _incredibly intimate_."

Garrus was growling, the sound rolling through the battery, making the deckplates vibrate beneath her feet in a way that was strangely erotic.

"Liara doesn't just accept or even understand my fear of the Reapers, she _shares_ it with me, the same way I share it with the Protheans. We experienced it. In a strange way, we lived it. We survived it. Not the way the Protheans would have, but in our own way, together. That experience is...a link, a bond that can't be broken or dissolved, not by anything, not even dea-"

"I understand the camaraderie of battle, Shepard," Garrus snarled. Strange how a snarl could sound both desperate and resigned.

"I know." Shepard tipped her chin in acknowledgement, and to hide a smile. Garrus was jealous, and she couldn't help being girlishly delighted by this proof of his affection, however little she might really wish to see him suffer. "And I know you also understand that while it can be...both extraordinarily intense and undeniably real, it usually isn't...strange as it sounds, I suppose the word is _personal_."

That was true. The linking of their minds had created a certain level of attraction between them, something she had never denied. Not to herself, and not to Liara. But she had also never doubted that as strong, as real, as _enduring_ as that bond was, it wasn't love. Well, maybe it _was _love. But not of the romantic sort.

And once Liara had had a little time to process the unexpected ardor of it, Shepard thought she had slowly begun to agree.

Garrus went suddenly and completely still, so still it made her nervous. It was as if someone had flipped a switch and cut all the power in his nervous system. Or it would have been like that if his eyes hadn't been so immediate and so alert, searing into the vulnerable planes of her face like a brand.

"Then what are we doing here, exactly, Shepard?" Garrus grated, sounding more confused than ever.

Shepard thought she understood. After all, if anyone had asked her to describe her relationship with Garrus before she'd stepped foot into the battery this afternoon, she probably would have said: _Brothers-in-arms. Comrades. Partners. _ Maybe it was that last word that was important, that made the difference.

It was a word that had been there, underscoring her feelings for him, without being noticed, for a long time. A very long time. But its meaning, what it implied or expressed, that the other two didn't...that was something she couldn't begin to explain. Not yet. Maybe not ever. It just..._was_, and she didn't feel the need to question it.

More than that, she didn't _want_ to question it... and it worried her that Garrus did.

"I don't know...I thought I did... but...I'm beginning to think..." Shepard sighed, feeling a little dazed and disconcerted herself.

"Listen, Garrus, I don't want to make you _uncomfortable_." If the cost of his comfort was for her to hold her tongue and keep her silence regarding feelings she was just beginning to realize were as much a part of her as her arms or her legs or the nose on her face, so be it. She was a marine. She was trained to survive, and she was the best of the best of the best at it, sir, and thank you very much, with no apologies. She had survived Akuze. She had survived Virmire. She had survived Ilos and the Citadel. She had survived-well, after a fashion-Alchera, and she would damn well survive this. Even if each and every gesture of affection she couldn't express would be like dying a little death, she would rather die a thousand times over than lose Garrus so much as once. She could and would survive anything with him in her life, standing by her side. She'd take what she could get from him with gratitude and with no regrets.

"Uncomfortable?" The word was a joke. When he first looked into her eyes in that med-clinic, he'd felt a sense of...something akin to recognition. He'd felt-for the first time in ages, maybe for the first time ever-as though someone had seen him, really seen all of him there was to offer, without judgement. He'd felt...accepted and approved. Welcome. Over time, that feeling had grown. On the Normandy...with her...he'd felt...

When he'd seen her on that bridge, walking toward him...it was like going home. The one place, the only place, he'd ever felt at ease was here...with her. He'd thought she'd known that. "You could never make me uncomfortable, Shepard."

Hell, that was the problem. The whole damned point. she wasn't just important...she wasn't just his commander...his mentor...his best and dearest friend...she was all of those things. She was...everything. Already. And if he gave into that...if he let himself fall...there was no net, no net at all. Something always went wrong...If something went wrong...

if it didn't work...if they didn't work...all he stood to lose was everything.


	26. With All Due Respect

**Note:** Can you wait for ME3? I can't! I'm going crazy!I'm keeping away from spoilers and keeping my fingers crossed for lots of gooey Garrus goodness! Needless to say updates will continue to be slow, but that enthusiasm and inspiration will be high. I hope my readers will stick with me for the ride.

All standard disclaimers still apply. Although I don't own the characters or universe, I do work hard on my little stories. Please don't print or repost without my knowledge. Thanks.

_**And thanks again to all the people who've taken time to encourage me by adding me or my story to favorites or alerts. And, most especially, thanks to those few who've written reviews. I welcome your interest, thoughts, and ideas-even constructive criticism. Your support is always appreciated, and often instrumental to maintaining the inspiration necessary to develop a story.**_

**Chapter-Specific Notes:** Takes place a little while after Treason, probably when the team is preparing to go and pick up the Reaper IFF for the end run. This chapter is shorter than I like them, but I think it's important, and I'd like to post and develop this story a bit more before the release of ME3-though I have more than full intentions of working on it long after that.

I imagine it might take place after _Parts Answering Parts_ 24 and 25: Doubts and From Doubt to Certainty, of course, this would place it after _Parts Answering Parts 23_: Just What to Say and I think another good fit for this chapter might be slightly before that.

* * *

"Tali tells me some of her people have suggested putting her name forward as a candidate for the open position on their Admirality Board."

"No, Shepard."

"Garrus..."

" Don't even say it. You know it's not going to happen."

"Are you saying I'm not allowed to make my final request?"

"I'm saying that even if Tali and I agreed-which we never would; we never would leave the ship, abort the mission...abandon you...But even if we _did_, we still wouldn't be able to give you what you really wanted. Our lives would still be in danger, Shepard."

"Garrus is right," Tali said, her voice quiet but firm. "I wouldn't even have a life to risk if it weren't for the two of you. If it weren't for you, I wouldn't be allowed to go back to the Flotilla at all, let alone with any influence."

"With all due respect," Garrus said, drawing out the pause after the words in a way that was quite deliberate, "You need us, Shepard."

"I'd never claim otherwise," she retorted. "Not even for a minute. But that's just it..." She paused, her brows drawing together in those ridges he'd always found so strangely reminisce of the plates on his own forehead. "No one's ever come back from the Omega 4 relay. I don't intend to let that stop me but... regardless.. I already know...I'm going to need people here, on the front line. People that know what we're up against. People I can count on to get our forces mobilized. People I can trust...and that's a damned short list. In fact... you two are looking at it."

Well, mostly, anyway...it might have included Liara, Joker, and Chakwas, too...at least to an extent. But rhetoric was sometimes more important than accuracy. They knew what she meant.

"You've got a point," Tali said, causing Garrus to whip around and stare at her in disbelief. She ignored him, a trick he could have sworn she'd picked up watching Shepard interact with him. In other circumstances, it might have been kind of funny, maybe even endearing. "But, Shepard, you know better than anyone how little influence conviction has in politics. Even if we stayed, I doubt we'd accomplish much of anything before you returned and having us with you might make the difference that brings you home. We aren't going to walk away from that for anything or anyone."

"Not even for you." Garrus added, meeting Tali's eye and tilting his chin in a gesture of gratitude he knew she understood. In spite of the mask, he was absolutely sure she smiled. Perhaps he could see it in the silver slivers of her eyes.


	27. Countermanded

**Note:** Can you wait for ME3? I can't! I'm going crazy!I'm keeping away from spoilers and keeping my fingers crossed for lots of gooey Garrus goodness! Needless to say updates will continue to be slow, but that enthusiasm and inspiration will be high. I hope my readers will stick with me for the ride.

All standard disclaimers still apply. Although I don't own the characters or universe, I do work hard on my little stories. Please don't print or repost without my knowledge. Thanks.

_**And thanks again to all the people who've taken time to encourage me by adding me or my story to favorites or alerts. And, most especially, thanks to those few who've written reviews. I welcome your interest, thoughts, and ideas-even constructive criticism. Your support is always appreciated, and often instrumental to maintaining the inspiration necessary to develop a story**_.

**Chapter-Specific Notes:** I really try to avoid posting such small chapters, but I felt like this really deserved to be included in the story in honor of the impending events of ME3. Not sure if this takes place direct after Arrival, or after the suicide run when the _Normandy_ has been refitted enough to head for place following all other currently extant chapters of _Parts Answering Parts_.

* * *

"Garrus...if this trial goes against me...against us..."

"About time we mounted another prison break," Garrus interrupted, the tension in his neck and back belying the humor in his voice. "I'd say we were overdue."

Shepard shook her head. "The thought is appreciated, but the action is countermanded. We can't win this war without the entire galaxy behind us. The common population has to believe I'm trying to protect the best interests of each and every one of us, not just myself or the Alliance. If they don't, they won't fight, and we _will _lose. I will go to prison, and I will do my time...and you will win this war for us-for all of us."

"Shepard..." there was so much to say...and there were no words to say it. "I know you admire my style, but-"

"I lost my entire unit the first time, too, Garrus. You _can_ do this," she said it simply, her eyes meeting his, level, calm, unwavering. Absolute. "You will."


	28. One Death

**_WARNING: THIS CHAPTER CONTAINS SPOILERS FOR ME3. The spoilers are for an early mission, not the end. _  
**

**Notes:** Like everyone else, I think the dialogue, characters, and gameplay for ME3 are amazing, but I'm pretty damn conflicted about the endings.

Updates will continue to be slow, but I hope my readers will stick with me for the ride.

All standard disclaimers still apply. Although I don't own the characters or universe, I do work hard on my little stories. Please don't print or repost without my knowledge. Thanks.

_**And thanks again to all the people who've taken time to encourage me by adding me or my story to favorites or alerts. And, most especially, thanks to those few who've written reviews. I welcome your interest, thoughts, and ideas-even constructive criticism. Your support is always appreciated, and often instrumental to maintaining the inspiration necessary to develop a story**_.

* * *

Even with her gun in her hands, Shepard could feel her fingers clenching into fists. She wanted to do more than just hit something—hit someone—she wanted to dig her fingernails into them like knives, bite and scratch and tear everything—everyone—around her into tiny shreds.

She'd just seen her worst nightmare come to life… and, like all nightmares, knowing what was coming hadn't given her any power at all to stop it, which only made it so much worse.

It hurt.

Her heart burned and throbbed until it felt as though her whole body was aflame, burning whatever was left of her away. It was enough to tint her entire view red—even redder than might be expected in a sandstorm on Mars—though, luckily perhaps, the rage that accompanied the pain only put a sharper edge on the clarity of her sniper's vision.

It was some satisfaction, but no consolation, to watch heads literally shatter into shards of blood and bone, fountains that ran as red as her rage.

They shouldn't be here.

Not her, not James, not Alenko…and not any of the people between them and whatever Hackett had sent them to retrieve. They should be on Earth, fighting. Fighting the Reapers.

Instead, they were here. Fighting each other.

And that didn't just mean her team was fighting Cerberus—they were _all_ fighting each other.

Alenko, who'd been there on her nine, who'd seen Sovereign on Eden Prime, and again in those last final moments at the Citadel when they thought they might just have lost already, might just be too late… he hadn't been there when they'd spoken with Sovereign on Virmire, that was true, but… he'd been on Ilos. He'd seen Vigil. He, better than anyone, he should have known.

She could forgive him for not rejoining her. She understood what he meant when he said he was Alliance first… she'd known that before he'd ever told her.

He didn't trust her.

Fine.

She didn't like it, but she could accept it.

But what she couldn't accept was that he didn't trust himself.

Yes, sir, no, sir, whatever you say, sir… even if what the higher-ups were saying patently defied the evidence of one's own eyes—more than that, the evidence of your own flesh, your blood, your bones, your scars, your experience. How could he have ignored it all so completely?

He'd had the access to the Council and Alliance she'd somehow lost. He could have… he _should _have… spent the last two and a half years fighting and kicking like mad, making all the noise he could manage, struggling to prepare them for the horror even he couldn't imagine, but of which he, at least, should have had some inkling…

And instead… he'd just… fallen into line.

And Earth...

was falling.

Anderson had pulled her back out of the fire again, and she'd repaid the favor by leaving him behind. The guilt sat there at the back of her throat, making her want to gag, making her want to _scream_ and scream and maybe never stop... but she couldn't, because she had a job to do.

Liara, at least, understood that. Her presence helped a bit, took the edge off just enough to keep Shepard from doing something she'd probably regret.

Shepard stood behind the asari, fuming.

Alenko's suggestion about the radio only upped her temperature.

First, she should have thought of it.

Most importantly, Garrus would have suggested exactly the same measure. She hated it that Alenko was here, making her life harder, while Garrus... she'd been dying to hear from him for months, sure he was equally anxious to hear from her... she didn't know where he was, and she could only hope like hell that it wasn't Earth... and that Earth was the only place hit. And she was already pretty damn sure it wasn't. She didn't want to think about that. It only aggravated her urge to scream or vomit.

Most immediately, Alenko's initiative irritated her because it only reminded her of how capable, how competent, how... oh, call it supportive... Alenko had once been. Once. When it had mattered less.

The tangled, throbbing, flaming mess of her emotions must have been even closer to radioactive than she'd realized, because Liara turned to look at her with an odd expression.

"What?" Shepard demanded shortly, teetering on the precipice between angry and defensive.

Liara raised an eyebrow, making Shepard feel guilty. The asari wasn't the one who deserved her rage. Alenko, maybe. Cerebus, probably. The Reapers, most assuredly. But Liara was only trying to help. "The major has become quite capable," she observed in her cool, quiet voice. A voice like water pouring over stone. It had always made Shepard think of a forest stream trickling down a rock face in some hidden, peaceful glade.

In spite of herself, she relaxed, just a touch. "That he has," she agreed wryly, wondering if Liara knew that was exactly what was bothering her... or if she was suggesting the atmosphere-she had to have noticed by now-was some by-product of the chemistry Shepard and Alenko shared-surely not, as she'd recognized Shepard's feelings for Garrus even before...

before Aratoht.

Most likely, Liara was trying to remind her that whatever her personal feelings toward the man might be, they were less important than getting the job done. And Shepard had to agree.

She sighed slightly, very slightly, and turned to follow Alenko through the door to the security room.

Just in time to see him crack the helmet on a dead Cerberus Operative who looked anything but human.

"They've done something to him," she muttered, more to herself than Alenko, but Alenko was beginning to develop a real knack for pushing her buttons.

"And by they... you mean Cerberus," he said as if that wasn't obvious. "Is this what they did to you?"

"You tell me," she snapped. "Do we look the same?"

"You look great," Alenko retorted drily. "But looks aren't everything, Shepard. Sometimes they can be-"

"Deceiving?" Shepard finished for him with a snort. "You done, Alenko, or do you have a few more hackneyed cliches you'd like to throw?"

Alenko shrugged. "Sorry, Shepard," he said, sounding anything but. "It's just that... ever since you joined Cerberus, I don't know who you are any more... I don't know _what _you are."

Shepard was struck with the sudden, almost hysterical, urge to laugh and she was horribly afraid that if she laughed, she'd never be able to stop. A year, a full year, asking herself that question and every possible variation. _Do you really think I know the answers any more than you? Do you really think you're only the one with doubts? Do you think you're doing any of us any favors by reopening my old wounds in the middle of hostile territory? So much for capable. _"How can you even ask me that?" she returned, annoyed to find she sounded more hurt and wistful than angry.

The _what _she was part... she'd put that behind her. Decided she was the sum of her thoughts, her feelings, and above all else, the sum of her actions. Whether the numbers that had come before were original or merely transcriptions, everything she'd done since the hard reboot, well, that was her. And, in spite of having done some pretty ugly things, the overall result was something she didn't really mind staring down in her mirror every morning. That was what counted, in the end. She knew that, and she didn't need Alenko demanding she second-guess it. Not now, not ever.

But especially not now.

The _who_ she was part...

A day ago, on Earth, when she was awaiting tribunal, well... it would have been understandable. He should have known-he _did_ know-she was right, the Reapers were coming. But he didn't know, couldn't know just how immediate the threat had been. If he doubted that... she could forgive. Killing an entire colony was an action almost too horrible to contemplate, and anyone who would-who could-commit such an act for anything less deserved to be doubted.

But now...

he ought to have figured out she hadn't done it because she disliked Batarians.

The Reapers had come.

She had obviously been telling the truth. And she had done what she had to do. Just as she had always done.

"How can you even ask me that?" she asked, annoyed to find she sounded more hurt and wistful than angry. _Some people are just too thick to have the sense beaten back into them._

"I... I just... need to know. Is the woman I loved still in there somewhere?"

_Maybe. Maybe not. I'm not sure she ever really was. What gets me is that I'm not sure the man I loved ever actually existed either. One death killed them both and I don't think they're getting resurrected. _"Cerberus didn't change me, Kaidan." _At least not any more than the Prothean Beacon did. Or Akuze. Or Virmire. We're all changing all the time. What matters is whether or not we change in a way that preserves some... integrity... between what we are and what we will be. And I think I have. As far as I can I tell. I thought my email made that pretty clear. Unless it didn't get through. _"Or the fact I care about you-" _although you're doing a good job of driving me down that road yourself. I hope you realize that particular destination would be pretty permanent. _ "But words aren't going to be enough to convince you, are they?"

And then a minor miracle happened.

Kaidan smiled. More than smiled. He chuckled. "No," he admitted, his tone decidedly less hostile than it had been since her death. "Probably not."


	29. War and Peace

**_WARNING: THIS CHAPTER CONTAINS SPOILERS FOR ME3. The spoilers _are_ for the end. There are also some spoilers for the From Ashes DLC character, very minor ones._  
**

**Notes:** Like everyone else, I think the dialogue, characters, and gameplay for ME3 are amazing, but I'm pretty damn conflicted about the endings. As for the upcoming announcement, I think it was planned for one month after game release, to coincide with PAX East. I'll be disappointed but not injured in my loyalty to BioWare if this isn't the case...

Updates will continue to be slow, but I hope my readers will stick with me for the ride.

All standard disclaimers still apply. Although I don't own the characters or universe, I do work hard on my little stories. Please don't print or repost without my knowledge. Thanks.

_**And thanks again to all the people who've taken time to encourage me by adding me or my story to favorites or alerts. And, most especially, thanks to those few who've written reviews. I welcome your interest, thoughts, and ideas-even constructive criticism. Your support is always appreciated, and often instrumental to maintaining the inspiration necessary to develop a story**_.

* * *

Synthesis...

Integration...

Evolution.

Javik had called it the cosmic imperative.

All she had to do was yield to the inevitable and there would be peace.

_Peace_. It sounded so right. It sounded so perfect. Every cell, every breath, every impulse in her body yearned for it with abandon, consuming and complete. That it should come only at the cost of her death was no real detriment. It might have bothered her if she thought there was the slightest chance that Garrus was back on Earth... alive. He'd ordered her to survive... she hated not to do as he'd asked, but, then, he hadn't exactly managed to duck. She didn't want to live without him. Not for anyone, not for anything. Not for earth. Not for the galaxy. Not even for him. Sometimes death was a relief. A comfort. A release. She felt so trapped... she was so tired...

Tired to death. Tired of death. Tired of destruction. Tired of war.

_Life is war._ Her own voice. Her own thought.

She remembered.

She remembered so clearly, felt overwhelmed again by loneliness and confusion, swamped even more deeply than she had been then, that night aboard the _Normandy, _ the night she...

but what did it matter? If life was war, it only stood to reason that death... only death could bring peace.

And if her death brought peace not only to her, but to the entire galaxy...

then she had fulfilled her purpose.

Garrus was waiting. And she was sure that when she greeted him there in that bar, he would understand.

But...

she couldn't bring herself to lift her foot, to take so much as that first step -and she realized, muddily, as if from far away, that it was just too easy. Nothing was ever easy. Nothing. It was the hardest, most bedrock truth of her life, the foundation on which everything she knew and believed about reality, about life, about death, about _herself_ rested.

A voice echoed in her ears again, or even more faintly than that, more a physical reflex like the jerk of knee or the twitch of an eyelid than a memory or a sound. _We all want. We all give to get what we want. _ Mordin's voice, brisk, controlled, subtly amused. His response to her exasperated exclamation that life ought to be easy. His own truth. And one that had struck her as undeniable. Sensible. Fundamental.

Shepard wanted peace. More than anything. More than life. But... but... there was something... something... bothering her...

and then, faintly, still muffled by mud and water, it clicked into place. She was willing to give her life to get peace... but why were the reapers-or their representative, or their controller, or their creator, or whatever the hell it was she was speaking with, whatever was watching here now, like a hawk, why were they willing to subsume themselves into a new existence? A new creation? What did they get? What did they _want_? Somehow, she had a very hard time believing it was peace...

"I... I don't know..." she said, the words thin and wavering and alien to her ears.

"You must choose," the glowing blue child, the avatar of the Catalyst, her salvation and her nemesis, said inexorably.

She looked again toward the central column of bright, white light. Death. Rest. Peace.

Synthesis.

an involuntary shiver ran up her spine. She felt the strangest urge to laugh at the familiarity of it... suddenly, she was there again, in the unexpected vastness of an unfamiliar bed, staring at the eerie blue glow of an empty fish tank, thinking of Saren.

Thinking of him because of something she'd heard in a Cerberus lab. A phrase she'd remembered him using in those last fevered days before he'd rallied his will and shot himself... before he'd done what he could to help her stop Sovereign_. _Bio-synthetic fusion. A mixture of man and machine...

She'd heard the words applied to herself on that Cerberus station, and she'd feared...

that she didn't know what she'd become.

_Shepard... you don't honestly think... Cerberus rigged you up so you could be overtaken as the indoctrinated servant of a reaper... do you? _Garrus. Humor and exasperation covering fear like the ceramic veneer on plated armor. His hands on her shoulders, anchoring her.

She still didn't know.

Evolution.

_The cosmic imperative._

Legion. Standing on a cliff, looking out over the horizon, apologizing to her for sacrificing himself.

Legion, standing in the AI Core on the Normandy, regarding her with detachment and something akin to affection. _Nazara told you this itself: "by using our technology you develop along the lines we desire." The geth do not wish to have the future given to us. _

She turned slightly to the right. And took a step. Not a big one, just a tiny shuffling little lurch.

Maybe, after all, even peace was not a gift, not if it was something imposed from outside instead of earned from within. Maybe it wasn't worth anything unless it was hard-won.

_We can't beat them, Shepard_. _We have to think like them. Convince them we're too useful to be destroyed. _

_No, I'd rather live free than die a slave. _

All she'd ever wanted, her entire adult life, was to be in control of her own fate.

She'd tried to live her life to achieve that, the power of choice, not just for herself, but for everyone she cared about, for everyone. For her, that was what it meant, _to protect and serve. _

How, then, could she take the choice to fight or to make peace away from the fleet, away from their children, away from _anyone_? She couldn't. She didn't have the right.

More steps.

One.

And one more.

Integration...

A stranger's face inside a Cerberus helmet, withered and gray. Kaidan's shocked face and accusing eyes. _Ever since Cerberus rebuilt you, I don't know who you are anymore. I don't know what you are._

Words on a datapad: _they call it integration. _

_I am not with Cerberus. You brought me back to save humanity, and that's what I'm going to do, without sacrificing the soul of our species to do it._

She didn't want to kill the geth... they had such potential for peace... She didn't want to sacrifice the quarians... but... _life is war. Maybe that is the Cosmic Imperative. _ And war...

_You still cling to hope that this war will end with your honor intact. _

And suddenly it came flooding back in a rush, the outraged disbelief she'd felt in the Citadel, catching sight of Saren trying to open the station for Sovereign.

The hard, brutal, burning knot of rage in her stomach as she'd knelt to affix the detonator to the heart of the Collector Base, graveyard of thousands-hundreds of thousands and more-of colonists, colonists she'd been trying to save.

The frantic disbelief driving her through the asteroid base of Kenson's damned project A colony sacrificed, the balance of life in the galaxy temporarily maintained... The guilt, the grief, the relief.

She was gaining momentum, and in that weird trick of battlefield adrenaline, it was sweeping the pain up in the current, carrying it away.

Her honor had been lost, lost and regained, a dozen times.

Her unit for herself on Akuze. Ashley for the STG team on Virmire. The hostages on Terra Nova and Zorya to prevent any further hostage-taking incidents. Toombs' vengeance-and her own-denied in the hopes of hobbling some of the atrocities committed by Cerberus. A cure for the krogan, delayed-though that, at least, was one injustice she'd had the opportunity to correct in person. She hoped it didn't prove to be a mistake. The rachni had.

War was _ruthless calculus_. She knew that. She always had.

Every N7 did. Hadn't she told James as much?

_You're real. A little crazy, but real._ Calm. Affectionate. Amused. Garrus and Garrus and Garrus. Garrus her wingman. Garrus who'd always backed her up. Garrus who'd always stood by her side. Garrus her partner. Garrus the shoulder she'd always needed to lean on. Garrus, who'd always believed in her, even when she didn't-and couldn't believe in herself. Garrus, the turian she loved. _I think we're going to kick the reapers back into whatever black hole they came out of... you were born to do this... get out there and give them hell._

She smiled and raised the pistol in her hand. It felt heavy, a little off-balance, but her hand was steady. She was going to do Garrus proud. She could do nothing less.


	30. Gone

**Notes:** Like everyone else, I think the dialogue, characters, and gameplay for ME3 are amazing, but I'm pretty damn conflicted about the endings. As for the upcoming announcement, I think it was planned for one month after game release, to coincide with PAX East. I'll be disappointed but not injured in my loyalty to BioWare if this isn't the case...

Updates will continue to be slow, but I hope my readers will stick with me for the ride.

All standard disclaimers still apply. Although I don't own the characters or universe, I do work hard on my little stories. Please don't print or repost without my knowledge. Thanks.

**Chapter-specific notes:** Takes place at the beginning of ME2. (**servantofclio-**I appreciate the feedback. I definitely want to write some more ME3 stuff for you...I just don't know when the muse will cooperate!)

**And thanks again to all the people whoe at the very beginning of ME2. _'ve taken time to encourage me by adding me or my story to favorites or alerts. And, most especially, thanks to those few who've written reviews. I welcome your interest, thoughts, and ideas-even constructive criticism. Your support is always appreciated, and often instrumental to maintaining the inspiration necessary to develop a story_.**

* * *

Joker was drawn back into the farthest corner of the pod, hunched and huddled in on himself, a wounded animal protecting a vulnerable and painful spot. His eyes were wide and wild. The shape of his mouth mirrored the posture, drawing in, tightening up, a rounded gap of pain.

Kaidan felt the bottom drop out of his stomach. He'd seen rachni, thorian creepers, and husks. He'd seen them blown into bits by grenades, seen their heads fountain up in the explosive aftermath of a well-timed sniper shot, seen them gutted by the blade extension on Wrex's shotgun... and he'd never felt this close to throwing up. His head throbbed in painful, broken thumps, as if the shrapnel of his shattered heart had somehow lodged in his temples. And, he suddenly realized, his knees had dissolved. He was standing upright by the grace of Garrus.

Garrus himself stood straight and sharp and stiff as a dragon's tooth, mandibles, forehead plates, arms, legs, knees, shoulders, elbows, everything pulled in absolutely tight and compact, as if his carapace had shrunk and didn't fit.

"Check the other pods," someone said.

"Kaidan... All the pods have already been accounted for, you know that," Liara's voice, cool and infinite and sad.

That was when he realized the voice he'd heard was his own. Realized it, but didn't believe it. Just as he didn't believe she was dead.

"No."

Joker stared, but not because he appeared to have registered anything but whatever it was that had put that look on his face.

Garrus and Liara stared.

No doubt if Tali and Wrex had been there they'd have stared.

"No," Kaidan said again, and this time the word was steadier, less harsh and desperate. "Shepard survived Akuze. She survived the Blitz. She survived having a reaper drop down on her head... we thought she was a goner then, didn't we, Garrus?"

The turian tilted his head slightly. Acknowledging the point, but sorrowfully, as if saluting a fallen comrade.

"Shepard is famous for surviving against any and all expectations," he insisted, though a distant part of him could hear an uncurrent to his voice that sounded... mournful. Pleading. "Why should now be any different?"

He felt the subtle shift in the stance of the turian beside him. Garrus, at least, wanted to believe. Well, that made sense. Garrus had been there, with him, in the rubble of the Citadel, stunned by a grief that had just begun to smart, when she'd come scrabbling into sight. Garrus knew... he knew... she wasn't gone. She was just delayed. Any second now...

"It is," Liara said. Her blue skin was pale in the cold, slanting light. It looked dry and gray, like hard-frozen soil. Or ash. "It just is." Her pupils were contracted so tightly they looked like pin-pricks in the too-blue irises of her eyes.

Kaidan wanted to question it, ask how she could make such a claim, but he didn't. He couldn't. The asari had linked her mind with Shepard's, not just once, not just twice, but three times, in order to help her make sense of the information forced on her by the Prothean beacon and the other asari commando. The bond those links had forged between them was so strong it was tangible, so much so that he'd begun to think... no, he was forced to admit that he might not know _how_ Liara knew, but he knew she did.

And that hurt.

It hurt him that someone, anyone, could claim any knowledge or any part of Shepard that didn't also-primarily-belong to him.

All the more so if it was the last part.

"She's... she's right," Joker said, his voice thin and distant, cracking over the words. "Shepard... didn't... she isn't... she..."

"What is it, Joker?" Liara asked softly, gently, stepping into the pod and bending one knee to bring herself to his level, putting a hand on his shoulder, compelling. "What happened?"

Kaidan resisted the sudden urge to hit them both with a singularity, just to force the heart-wrenching image they presented to break apart. Garrus must have felt something, a tensing of muscles, or a tingle of gathering dark energy, because his hand tightened on Kaidan's elbow, just enough to be noticeable. Kaidan didn't move, but he didn't give a damn about what had happened either. He cared about one thing, and only one thing. "Where is she?"

"Shepard... convinced me to leave... practically carried me to the pod... she was standing... right... right..." the pilot choked on the words, making a short, sharp sound horribly akin to a sob. Joker raised a shaking hand and pointed. He was pointing just beyond the hatchway of the pod, nearly exactly where Kaidan and Garrus now stood.

"The beam... it hit, broke the ship apart. I could see her falling away..."

"No." The word was so rough as to be nearly unrecognizable. Everyone pretended they hadn't heard it. It was almost as though he hadn't actually said it. "She wouldn't just fall," Kaidan said flatly. "She never gives in, not even to the inevitable."

Garrus made a sound that could conceivably have been a chuckle, if only it hadn't been so damn sad. "Especially not to the inevitable." Like Sovereign.

"She..." Joker's eyes fell away from them.

There was a long pause.

"Joker," Kaidan rasped.

"Caught herself," Joker finished. "There." He pointed to the framework of the hatch. "Dammit! I should have lunged for her! Pulled her in!" Joker exploded, so loudly Liara rocked backward in shock. Kaidan flinched, feeling the sound reverberate through his head.

"Yeah," Kaidan ground out, the word cutting through his tongue like ground glass, so deep and sharp it scored his soul. Liara shot him a warning look. He glared back at her, defiant.

"She... she... looked at me," Joker said more quietly. "Eye to eye, like she was trying to tell me something. Then..." He paused, licked lips as his throat worked. "She... let go..." he whispered.

Silence quaked through their little group.

"Not... entirely..." Joker added eventually. "Just.. one hand... she... used it to punch the seal-and-release interface..."

_Kaidan_, her voice throbbed through his head, making lights flicker at the corner of his vision, _just go. _

"... the door closed... I hadn't even heard the seal... that beam... that damn beam... it fired... cut... right... right between us... and..."

"Did it hit her?" Liara's voice was finally starting to vibrate with some of the tension Kaidan had been feeling since Joker had refused his offer to help him to the pod. This pod. The one Shepard had been lost helping him into. He was grinding his teeth together, the sound grating through his temples, behind his eyes.

Joker was shaking his head from side-to-side, over and over again. His eyes were staring into space, as if he was seeing something none of the rest of them could. "No," he said softly. "No... she just... let go."

"She was spaced," Kaidan translated grimly, startled at the sound of his own voice, startled that he'd managed to process enough to say it aloud. But surprise was surpassed by hope. "The hardsuit would give her some protection... if she could avoid the atmosphere... we have to get someone looking for her-now. How much air is in those tanks? Dammit... they made me repeat that hundreds of times in basic..."

Garrus was looking around as if in search of ship or a shuttle or a working radio, but Joker was hugging himself and Liara was shaking her head. "Kaidan... I'm sorry... so sorry, but... Shepard is lost... she's gone."


	31. Grief

**Notes:**

Like everyone else, I think the dialogue, characters, and gameplay for ME3 are amazing, but I'm pretty damn conflicted about the endings. **I HAVEN'T HAD A CHANCE TO PLAY THE EC AND I'M TRYING LIKE MAD TO AVOID SPOILERS UNTIL I CAN.** It should be soon…In the meantime, the overall community reaction I've seen leads me to believe that the EC will leave me feeling satisfied with the fruits of my patience.

Updates will continue to be slow, but I hope my readers will stick with me for the ride.

All standard disclaimers still apply. Although I don't own the characters or universe, I do work hard on my little stories. Please don't print or repost without my knowledge. Thanks.

**Chapter-specific notes:** Takes place in ME2, sometime prior to Horizon, maybe about the time Kaidan is ordered out there. Believe there will be a companion chapter titled "Silence" eventually. (**servantofclio-**I appreciate the feedback. I definitely want to write some more ME3 stuff for you...I just don't know when the muse will cooperate!)

**And thanks again to all the people who**_**'ve taken time to encourage me by adding me or my story to favorites or alerts. And, most especially, thanks to those few who've written reviews. I welcome your interest, thoughts, and ideas-even constructive criticism. Your support is always appreciated, and often instrumental to maintaining the inspiration necessary to develop a story**_**.**

* * *

Kaidan wished he could contact some of the old squad, ask them if they'd heard anything, if they thought the rumors could possibly be true, just to hear them say no. Because if the rumors were true... Shepard would have contacted him. First and foremost. He would know.

But what he knew...

was that the rumors just couldn't be true.

They couldn't be.

It was absolutely impossible.

Shepard had been spaced. Unequivocally. Joker had watched it happen from less than four feet away. Kaidan had seen his face, seen his eyes, seen the odd, hunched, wounded way in which he'd huddled into himself all through the days after the crash, the days leading up to the stilted surreality of the memorial service... Joker wasn't lying.

Even if he'd been able to doubt that, Liara claimed to have felt it firsthand.

What stung, really stung, more than anything was that he'd been expecting this. For so long... so long... after she'd... died... he'd known she was alive, felt it with every fiber of his being. He'd looked for her behind every open door, stepping off every arriving ship, expected her words, her voice in every message ping that drifted in from the extranet... until... he didn't even know when he'd begun to accept her death... maybe he never really had... he'd just been forced to admit that-dead or not-

Liara was absolutely and exactly right. Shepard was gone. She was gone... and she wasn't coming back.

When the Alliance ships arrived before she did, he'd started to doubt. The doubt began congealing into fear, creeping around his throat and squeeze like the cold, dead hand of a husk when the Alliance troops had combed the planet and the Alliance ships had combed the atmosphere and nearby space as well as they could... without so much as a faint bleep on the LADAR.

The fear had started to solidify and take root in his stomach like a block of tentacled icy grief in the fortnight they'd spent at Arcturus and then at the Citadel, going over those last moments again and again... reliving the death of the _Normandy_... without Shepard ever busting in to set the record straight.

And at the end of the month, when Anderson began to speak to the squad about tentative arrangements for a memorial service, the tentacled block of ice still lodged in Kaidan's gut had seized his spine, pulling and constricting until ice crackled along his biotic jack, through his temples and down into his jaw.

That service... it was all a blank, black smoking hole of memory. Even at the time, he couldn't see, couldn't feel. He was just sitting there... stiff, unmoving... dead.

He couldn't remember that day, not a minute of it... but...

He'd never forgotten.

And he never would.

Not only was Shepard gone, but there was nothing of her left. Not so much as a word. He'd never thought about it, but... well.. he couldn't help but feel betrayed. Forgotten. Ignored. He'd been carrying a letter for her about on his omni-tool, carefully backed up with Alliance Command and his banker, too, for good measure... for longer than he cared to admit, even now... when it couldn't possibly begin to matter. He'd thought...

It wasn't like her.

Shepard was prepared. She was always prepared.

So she was silent...

but could he bring himself to admit he'd already finished that thought?

She had left no word to anyone on the squad, not even Garrus or Liara... as far as he could tell from what little he'd seen and heard... not even to her parents...

It was as if she'd believed the myth of her own invulnerability even further than he or Garrus... believed it to the point of allowing into to evolve into insensitivity to those she loved... those who loved her most. And if she'd done that...

it was like losing the woman he'd loved all over again to believe she could ever be so blind... she'd always seemed so acutely aware of his feelings... of the feelings of people she'd never even met... the woman he'd loved was sympathetic, _empathetic_...and she was gone... gone without a trace.

Grief howled through him like the void, endless and unfilled.


	32. The Blank Page

**Notes:**

Like everyone else, I think the dialogue, characters, and gameplay for ME3 are amazing; the EC and Leviathan added SOO much to the endings. A huge improvement. Updates will continue to be slow, but I hope my readers will stick with me for the ride.

All standard disclaimers still apply. Although I don't own the characters or universe, I do work hard on my little stories. Please don't print or repost without my knowledge. Thanks.

**Chapter-specific notes:** Takes place pre-ME1. Also written in the first person. Would be interested to hear if you like this or prefer 3rd person for Shep-PoV.

**And thanks again to all the people who**_**'ve taken time to encourage me by adding me or my story to favorites or alerts. And, most especially, thanks to those few who've written reviews. I welcome your interest, thoughts, and ideas-even constructive criticism. Your support is always appreciated, and often instrumental to maintaining the inspiration necessary to develop a story**_**.**

* * *

Waiting.

I shifted on the blocky, nondescript sofa-I'd never quite been able to figure out what it was about modern society that dictated all furniture had to look exactly the same or that the standard had to be so milk-mild and boring as to be forgotten even when you were in the room with it, but...

the furniture wasn't my problem. Indicative of it, maybe.

I felt like my entire life up to this point had been spent here, on this sofa, uncomfortable and unmoving, but not entirely fixed. Static. A hiss.

White noise.

What a way to describe a childhood.

Sitting here, waiting to sign it over, consign it to the history books, I wanted to look back on my childhood with one last valedictory glance. Tender, fleeting, bittersweet.

The turning of a page.

Maybe it will be. Maybe it is.

But the page is blank.

Waiting.

It is, oddly, the only fitting way to end my minority.

If only I weren't so tired of it.

Tired of waiting.

I've done so much of it... try as I might to remember practical jokes, wild adventures, drunken parties, hopeful daydreams... what stands out, what remains constant through all the jumble of the years is the waiting.

Waiting in plain vanilla little rooms like this one, an anteroom to nothing- or maybe everything- a coffin, a box, a neat little package, all wrapped up and containing air, not hot, exactly, but warm-warm and a little stale. Containing me.

Contained.

Constrained.

Never speaking, never taking action.

Yes, that is me.

Waiting.

Just waiting.

Waiting to be told Mom-or Dad-but usually Mom-has a new assignment. Waiting to be told we're moving.

Waiting to adjust to the new Alliance outpost.

The new world. New gravity. New sun. New sky. New plants. New people. New expectations. New and new and new again... until the very new seems old. Or maybe just constant. Worn and repeated. Plain. Uninteresting.

Like the room I'm in.

Waiting, waiting, waiting to say goodbye, the final hug, the final kiss, the final walk up that long, narrow plank and into a ship... the final launch into the sky... again and again and again... the final isn't final, and that's a relief, but it always could be... and someday it will be... and you won't know... not then, not until it's over, not until it's too late... waiting, always waiting, waiting to know when-if- you will say hello... and then goodbye... again.

It's hard. The waiting.

Maybe the hardest part of it all is that it doesn't really seem hard. It seems easy, far too easy.

Waiting is being bored and worried and angry... but you can't complain...

or you can complain as much as you want.

I did more than my fair share of it. I remember.

But my parents didn't stop and listen. The Alliance didn't stop and listen. The wide open sky, the distant rock vistas, the close dark trees, maybe they listened. Sometimes I thought they did... sometimes I knew they didn't.

Whatever was beyond them, the stars, the great black void, adulthood, eternity...

whether they listen or not, there's no telling. They're unchanging. Unmoved.

And like them, whatever you tell them...

It is what it is and you have to live with it.

Unless you prefer the alternative.

And most people don't.

I hear the words in their voices-my mother's voice tight and impatient, my father's voice calm and almost amused-and I'm not sure if I'm smiling or scowling at the sound of them.

And that is when I hear the recruitment officer call my name.

I stand up and walk over to his console and hope like hell my step looks confident, because I can feel my knees shaking.

He reels off the standard boilerplate. I hear all of it and listen to none of it.

I am what I am, too.

I wish contracts were still signed with a pen or an old-fashioned computer stylus, something heavy, something I could feel the weight of in my hand. Something I could reach out and take...

but there is just a glow of energy hovering above a plain, flat desk.

I know I can't, but I think I can feel the slight warm hum of it washing up into my face, coloring my complexion, changing my face.

I take a breath.

This is it.

Soon, I will be the one walking away. The one walking up that plank, and eventually back down it, full stories to tell. A veritable tome of experience, a vivid memory on every page.

I hold out a thumb, press it into the empty, oddly-lit space.


	33. Calibrations

**Notes: **Updates will continue to be slow, but I hope my readers will stick with me for the ride.

All standard disclaimers still apply. Although I don't own the characters or universe, I do work hard on my little stories. Please don't print or repost without my knowledge. Thanks.

**Chapter-specific notes:** Takes place not long after Garrus' ME2 loyalty mission.

**And thanks again to all the people who**_**'ve taken time to encourage me by adding me or my story to favorites or alerts. And, most especially, thanks to those few who've written reviews. I welcome your interest, thoughts, and ideas-even constructive criticism. Your support is always appreciated, and often instrumental to maintaining the inspiration necessary to develop a story**_**.**

* * *

Garrus had lost track of how long he'd spent sequestered in the Main Battery, hunched over the console, watching streams of numbers scroll swiftly by-each sharply delineated, their meanings and their consequences as sure and solid as concrete.

At first, following Shepard had been like that. He hadn't stopped to consider, hadn't even really asked her for permission. There wasn't really a choice-he'd followed her because he'd had to, because it was the right-the _only_-thing to do.

Shepard had vowed to kill Saren herself because the Council had already proven themselves unable-or maybe just unwilling-to contain the danger he represented to themselves, to human colonists, to the galaxy at large. And yet...Shepard had shown herself reluctant to kill Saren while he might yet be turned to some good use.

Garrus didn't kid himself into thinking that was mercy.

It was practicality in the end. Sometimes, a fight took every resource you could muster, so you didn't waste them when you found them. Period.

Which was exactly why Shepard hadn't put a bullet through Zaeed's head at the Eldfell-Ashland refinery, however much her fingers must have been itching to do it.

It was part of why she'd walked away from the workers and let them die, however much it killed her to do it.

Vido Santiago was the rest of the reason.

As the long-term head of the Blue Suns, he'd taken more than one group of workers hostage...if he lived, he was sure to do it again, and it was hardly likely that would be the only thing he'd do, let alone the worst.

So...if killing him cost the lives of these workers but saved the lives of countless victims in the future...Shepard would kill him...particularly if doing so also happened to help her muster a little extra firepower to protect the entire galaxy against a much more dangerous threat. Even if it was firepower she didn't particularly like... though while she might have heartily disliked Zaeed at the time, overall she seemed almost fond of him in a begrudging sort of way... as she'd told Garrus at the time, it was more that she and Zaeed _disagreed_...

something she and Garrus had almost never done... until... Sidonis.

But, ultimately, Garrus' revenge was different than Zaeed's.

Partly because he had given her an option, but mostly because...

whatever Sidonis had done, he was clearly too much of a mess to be danger to anyone else in the future...

Garrus understood that much.

He ought to, he'd seen it more than once in precedent-

Mordin's compatriot Maelon had to die for an inability to repent his dangerous scientific goals and unethical experiments. Experiments that might all too easily be repeated.

Shepard had allowed-encouraged-Garrus himself to kill Saleon because Saleon had proven himself a threat to others for as long as he lived, a threat C-Sec had already proven themselves incapable of keeping in containment...

But she'd managed to spare both the "father" and the L2 biotics who'd gone and done something stupid out of desperation. He wasn't quite sure-even now-she would have been able to bring herself to kill them, in spite of her violent dislike of terrorists, particularly the type that took hostages.

And that damn doctor, the one on Ontarom... the one with her friend holding a gun to his head...

well, now that he thought about it, she'd talked that guy down too. He should have known, should have expected. But, really, he had to admit to himself-didn't he?-maybe he had.

That was what he hated most of all.

That he understood.

Actually, no. That wasn't true. At least not entirely.

What bothered him _most _was that some part of him-a part that grew larger every day-couldn't help feeling that the death of his team might be worth it.

He tried to tell himself that finding some good in the bad was not the same as approving the bad, that being glad to rejoin Shepard however it had happened wasn't the same as being glad his team had died, but...he wasn't sure he believed it, not really.

If losing them-all of them-was what it took to bring Shepard back to him...

The gunnery door cracked like lightning.

"All right, Vakarian," Shepard said, her voice tense, tired. "Spill it."

"Shepard, spilling anything in the Main Battery would be inadvisable," EDI interposed.

"It?" Garrus asked, fanning the plates on his forehead a bit, very much the equivalent of a raised eyebrow.

"It," Shepard reiterated firmly. "As in... the reason why you've been avoiding me."

"Avoiding you?" Garrus repeated skeptically.

Shepard crossed her arms, lowered her chin and _looked _at him.

Garrus rocked back on his heels, tilted his own chin up and back, and returned the look with interest. "Shepard, every time you step off this ship, I'm right behind you."

Shepard blinked, the _look _dissolving into something else, something almost pained. Or maybe it was just a trick of the light, because as quickly as he thought he'd seen it, it disappeared.

"Just like old times," Shepard said dryly. It was a statement, but Garrus had the oddest impression it might just be a question.

"I wouldn't have it any other way."

Shepard smiled slightly, reached out and thumped him on the shoulder in an affectionate sort of way, sighed and shook her head. "You never objected to me interrupting you when you were working on the Mako or in the armory, helping Ash out. What are you doing in here that's so damn important you keep shutting me out?"

Trying not to think of the first _Normandy_, of the great, tearing buzz of those golden beams of energy as they tore through the hull like a turian talon splicing an old-fashioned soda can in half...something he'd been harassed into doing one afternoon by a very bored Shepard, an equally-bored Williams and a slightly apologetic Alenko, all observed by a highly amused Wrex.

Trying not to think of the silence of the night preceding those shots, trying not to think of how the _Normandy _had never gotten so much as a shot off, not one. Of course, the gunnery chief had been KIA, and neither the Council nor the Alliance had seen fit to appoint a replacement, temporary or otherwise, or even to give Garrus the necessary clearance to fill in. But... if he'd had clearance...if he'd tried...

would it have made a difference?

Would they have been able to fight their way free?

He wished it had happened that way.

He wanted the comfort of the fantasy...

It haunted him...he'd wanted the chance to see what the Normandy could do in a fight...Alenko was too damn cautious, too controlled, but he'd been right-the first up the ladder rarely made it over the wall in one piece...and even Shepard was no exception.

They'd been caught completely unaware, unaware and outgunned...

Most likely, even if he'd had clearance, he wouldn't have time to do anything. If he'd tried to fight it out, he might have been the one Shepard had died trying to reach...

would she be standing here without him?

or would all three of them-Garrus, Shepard, and Joker-all be dead, gone beyond redemption?

What might have been didn't matter.

Only what had been.

He had lived. He had become a vigilante and lived to regret it.

Only what was.

Joker was at the helm. Shepard was standing in this room now. _Alive._

Still chasing across the galaxy, righting wrongs.

Even confronting the Collectors themselves, right out of urban legend.

And if the Collectors had tech even remotely like whoever-whatever-they had run into off of Alchera... "I don't like our chances," he said grimly. "Not unless we upgrade the guns."

Shepard slid down onto the crate she'd been standing next to.

The lights in the battery flickered low and red, catching in the fissures of her skin, erupting into view like veins of lava, making her look as if she was breaking slowly apart.

Garrus hissed between his teeth, a turian curse, rough and succinct.

Shepard raised a hand. She looked calm, composed, even the lines of the scars seemed to be cooling rapidly. "We can get you any gun you want," she said. "Money, resources, not an object. Any gun you want, Garrus."


	34. Ghost Town

**Notes: **Updates will continue to be slow, but I hope my readers will stick with me for the ride.

All standard disclaimers still apply. Although I don't own the characters or universe, I do work hard on my little stories. Please don't print or repost without my knowledge. Thanks.

**Chapter-specific notes:** Takes place after Horizon in ME2, probably slightly after the related Shepard/Garrus chapters _Zombie_, _Half-Spoken Words_, and _The Continuous Thread._

**And thanks again to all the people who**_**'ve taken time to encourage me by adding me or my story to favorites or alerts. And, most especially, thanks to those few who've written reviews. I welcome your interest, thoughts, and ideas-even constructive criticism. Your support is always appreciated, and often instrumental to maintaining the inspiration necessary to develop a story**_**.**

* * *

Waiting for the Alliance to return and pull him off Horizon had to be three of the hardest days of Kaidan's life. They reminded him... they were far too reminiscent...

He felt stranded-

well, he was stranded, actually.

Kaidan snorted with humor and poured another three fingers of whiskey into the glass, raising it slightly, swirling the contents in the light filtering through the window...

and cut his eyes quickly away from the landscape outside.

Oh, it was lush and green. Bright. Cheerful. Idyllic.

And it reminded him he wasn't alone, not quite.

There were people outside, talking loudly, moving quickly, trying to cover all the thousand and one tasks of the missing...

There were so few of them. The bustle and the noise only seemed to emphasize the emptiness of the settlement surrounding them. A ghost town.

And Kaidan, like the rest of them, felt like he must be a ghost to be living in the midst of it.

He felt dead.

Lost.

Exposed.

Abandoned.

He felt like he had-for days-on Alchera.

And he didn't know if he could take it.

He wished... he almost wished... he'd gone with them. Just to avoid it. This feeling. The waiting.

He tried to stay busy, he tried not to think, but they were always there in the shadows, lurking, waiting, whispering... doubts, desires, confusions, questions...

Them.

His two closest friends. The last two people in the universe in he'd ever expected to see again.

He was the one living in a ghost town, but he was the one who was haunted.

Maybe he was dead and didn't know it.

Maybe he was never going to get off this rock again.

Maybe that was for the best.

Because if he did, he didn't have the faintest idea what he was supposed to tell Anderson.

That he'd seen a ghost?

Kaidan gave another snuff of bitter laughter and raised the glass again, doing his best to burn the sudden lump in his throat away.

The thing that bugged him, the thing he kept coming back to most, was that she was with Garrus.

Back on the Normandy, before she'd died, Garrus knew Shepard better than anyone... well, better than anyone but him.

No matter how good the fake was, she couldn't fool him.

Garrus might have been a bit of a shot in the dark, but he'd always been a straight shot nonetheless.

Kaidan found it hard to believe he'd ever countenance joining up with Cerberus, even if Shepard had somehow faked her death...

and as much as it looked as though she had...Kaidan's heart kept whispering in his ear that she would never, never, never have put her squad or her crew in danger, let alone destroyed the Normandy, just to walk away. Shepard didn't run away from anything. The geth, husks, the thorian, Wrex's outrage, Sovereign, Saren, Ashley's sacrifice, the Council's disbelief...

she'd faced them all dead-on.

If she was going to join Cerberus because she was frustrated with the Council and the Alliance, no doubt she would have made damn sure everyone knew instead of pretending to meekly follow orders. When had she ever done that?

She hadn't.

That was him, all him.

And that-he-had gotten her killed.

He knew it and he hated it.

He wasn't sure who or what he hated more-himself for following orders or her for telling him what to do and expecting-no, knowing-he was going to do it... especially when she could have prevented this morass of feeling that had him tangled up inside. Saving people was what she did, wasn't it? And saving him would have been so easy.

All she had to do to save him was to come back to him alive.

But, she hadn't, had she?

He'd hoped. And he'd waited...

He'd waited for so damn long.

He'd waited too damn long.

But, then, that wasn't the point, was it?

It wasn't Shepard. It couldn't be.

Shepard, the real Shepard, would never have walked away from the Alliance, not without asking him to come with her...

Doubt brushed the edges of his mind just the way her fingers had ghosted along the nape of his neck in a lingering caress the night before Ilos. And, just as it had then, every fine hair on his body stood at attention, pimpling his skin with a chill of shock and awe.

She'd told him she doubted she deserved to be addressed by her rank...

Maybe that had been her asking... or about to ask...

but they'd gotten swept up in the moment...

Apparently she'd found the time to brief Garrus.

That bothered him, and what bothered him more was that it wasn't really that much of a surprise.

But if she'd asked Garrus, if he'd dropped out of sight, left the Citadel to go and join her, why had he seemed so genuinely surprised-even outraged-to find Kaidan had been hearing rumors he hadn't mentioned to the rest of the old squad?

Really, he'd been doing them a favor, sparing them the restless nights that had plagued him so horribly, the hours spent waiting, remembering, straining for the sound of her approaching footsteps...

Garrus had to have known something...

He was with her, wasn't he?

But even so, how could they possibly have arranged...

it wasn't her.

It _couldn't_ be her.

She wouldn't have left him waiting this long.


End file.
